At M+ Exhibition
Lee Bul: From 1998 to Now at M+ Museum in Hong Kong offers a powerful look at one of Asia’s most important contemporary artists. On view until August 9, 2026, the retrospective brings together more than three decades of work by Lee Bul, an artist known for questioning beauty, power, technology, and the promises of the future. Lee Bul’s work often feels caught between past and future. She has described her practice as a kind of “perpetual present,” and that idea runs through the exhibition. Her sculptures, installations, drawings, and models bring together failed utopias, modern history, and the unease of living in a world shaped by rapid technological change. The exhibition begins with Lee Bul’s large-scale architectural works, including her well-known Mon grand récit series. These installations look like fragments of futuristic cities or broken monuments. They suggest ambition, progress, and collapse all at once. Instead of presenting utopia as something perfect, Lee Bul shows how easily grand dreams can fall apart. The mood shifts with her Cyborg and Anagram series, which helped bring her international attention in the late 1990s. These sculptures combine the elegance of the human body with the strange forms of machines. Some figures are missing limbs or appear unfinished, challenging traditional ideas of beauty and perfection. Seen today, these works feel especially relevant. In a world shaped by artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and digital identities, Lee Bul’s question still lands sharply: what happens to the human body when it becomes tied to technology? The final part of the exhibition gives visitors a closer look at her process. Sketches, models, and preparatory drawings reveal how her complex installations begin, often with delicate lines and small studies before becoming immersive environments. More than a career survey, Lee Bul: From 1998 to Now feels like a meditation on progress, failure, and what it means to be human. It is thoughtful,…