Sol Enae Lee (b. 1982, Seoul, South Korea) is an artist who currently lives and works in Seoul, Korea and Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
She holds a BA (2006) and MFA (2014) in Korean Painting from the Ewha Woman's University, Seoul, and an MA Fine Arts from HKU University of the Arts Utrecht (2020).
Sol Enae Lee’s practice revolves around translation and, going beyond language semantics, articulates things that cannot be expressed in words. She understands translation in a broader sense and regards it as a medium in itself, instead of as a means to communicate across languages. Text functions as a point of departure for her work. She analyses the writings of others as well as her own, and uses words to produce scores in the form of diagrams, short poetic texts and drawings. These scores form the basis of a continuous process of translation between various media as a way to embody texts indifferent ways and open up spaces. In particular, the artist explores performative, often ephemeral elements such as movement, sound, and light, to reflect the boundaries of language. She collaborates with other artists as well as with the audience to expand the meaning of a translation.
Solo exhibitions include Life on the Street, Gallery Hyun, Seoul, South Korea (2012) and Crow Sse Sse Sse, The 3rd place, Seoul(2017). Selected group shows include Speaking to other, Seongbuk Museum of Art, Seoul (2013); Small things, Cámeral Comercio, Bogotá, Colombia(2015) and Today, Nobody was there, Art Space Pool, Seoul (2018). She was a performance artist for Dawn Breaks (by Jewyo Rhii and Jihyun Jung), Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, South Korea (2016); and co-initiator of, and performer in Paper Tragedy, a performance work as part of Dawn Breaks, Art Sonje Center, Seoul (2017). Sol Lee directed the performances Actions to be Above during Venice International Performance Art Week and Dissenting bodies Marking time, both Venice, Italy (2020); and Listen, Crescent Moon Space, Bangkok, Thailand (2016). She collaborated with M.C. Julie Yu on the walking project Folding Space Project 2.0, IMPAKT Festival; and In Between Us, AG gallery, Utrecht (2019). With Gordon H. Williams, she made the video performance This is a difficult email to send, TOA Festival, Berlin, Germany (2019) and SHIFT biennale, Scotland, UK (2020). She was the winner of the 2010 Husohoe Foundation Young Artist Prize, and received a grant for young artists from the Seoul Cultural Foundation in 2017. In 2018, Sol Lee published A diving competition was held in the swamp, a book containing several of her texts and drawings-based works.