Algorithmic cage: Artist challenges myth of ‚free‘ web surfing

Music Ye-hwan’s „The Barnacles“ (2025) / Courtesy of G Gallery

Because the introduction of the web, its intangible and limitless nature has typically been in comparison with a free-flowing physique of water — the place we „surf“ the online, „stream“ its content material, and „dive into“ the depths of the Deep Internet.

To many, it seems like a high-speed, freewheeling aqueous utopia, the place an limitless sea of data is available on the click on of a button.

Internet artist Music Ye-hwan disrupts this phantasm of digital utopianism. Whereas skepticism concerning the web’s idealistic picture is nothing new, her strategy to expressing it’s refreshingly distinctive.

Via “anti-user-friendly” web sites and 3D projection mapping on natural cardboard constructions, Music reimagines internet surfers not as autonomous navigators however as swimmers trapped in a relentless whirlpool — and even as unmoving barnacles, passively feeding on the curated tides of algorithms.

“I wished to visualise in a tangible method how the web, as soon as celebrated as a haven for free-roaming internet surfers, has remodeled into an atmosphere the place such freedom is not doable,” she instructed The Korea Occasions at G Gallery in southern Seoul, the place her newest solo exhibition, “The Web Barnacles,” is on view.

“The customers resemble barnacles, clustering collectively and immobile. In actuality, they aren’t navigating in any respect, but they continue to be trapped within the phantasm of crusing.”

The standardized internet interfaces and hidden surveillance mechanisms, designed to supply straightforward, streamlined entry, are, the truth is, what shapes and controls the digital expertise from starting to finish, she suggests.

Music Ye-hwan’s „The Surfers‘ Suspicion“ (2025) / Courtesy of the artist

Music’s critique arises from her personal expertise as a consumer expertise and consumer interface (UX/UI) designer. It was by her day job {that a} persistent query started to take form: Why does UX/UI design typically really feel so standardized, and what does “user-friendly” actually imply?

“My entire work revolved round creating easy-to-access designs, however the extra I considered it, the extra I spotted it was actually about steering folks to get hooked on the platform, basically addicting them,” she famous. “It struck me that as the web atmosphere grew extra superior, it more and more felt like a construction designed to devour its customers.”

The artist’s “anti-user-friendly” web sites yield a cascade of counterintuitive outcomes, the place acquainted actions like clicking, dragging, scrolling and swiping set off completely sudden outcomes. This deliberate disruption is supposed to defamiliarize the consumer expertise we so typically take without any consideration.

Music Ye-hwan’s „The Whirlpool“ (2025) / Courtesy of G Gallery

But, maybe probably the most eye-catching gem in her observe — and the centerpiece of her G Gallery present — is her architectural installations. In “The Barnacles” and “The Whirlpool,” shifting pictures and icons are projection-mapped onto towering cardboard lattices.

The clips, both sourced from the web or crafted by her personal palms, are bounded by rectangular surfaces, suggesting how each act of browsing the net is tightly managed and controlled, unable to interrupt free from its algorithmic confines.

As her works proceed to realize recognition and seem in biennales worldwide, Music shared plans to additional discover the geographically sure nature of the web in her upcoming tasks.

“Though the web feels ubiquitous, on-line realms are inherently formed by the laws of particular person nations,“ she stated. „The forms of content material which can be censored differ by nation; as an example, in South Korea, entry to any North Korean web sites is strictly prohibited.”

“The Web Barnacles” runs by Feb. 15 at G Gallery. In Might, Music shall be featured on the gallery’s solo sales space on the Frieze New York artwork truthful.

Along with her solo endeavors, she was chosen as one of many 15 “Younger Korean Artists 2025,” the flagship group exhibition hosted by the Nationwide Museum of Trendy and Modern Artwork, Korea (MMCA).