Songzio presents Metamorphosis, the first solo exhibition by artist Byungsub Kim, on view at Galerie Noir from December 19, 2025, through February 22, 2026. The exhibition brings together materials shaped by different historical moments and places them in direct relation, allowing their physical and cultural properties to generate new meaning. Rather than treating these materials as static references, Kim frames them as active participants in a process shaped by time, use, and transformation.
At the center of Metamorphosis stands a dialogue between antique furniture and stainless steel. Each material carries its own temporal weight. The furniture reflects accumulated use, craft traditions, and domestic histories, while stainless steel signals industrial production and modern manufacture. When these elements share space, they do not simply coexist.
Kim approaches this meeting of materials as an event rather than a design exercise. The works suggest moments where different eras appear to borrow duration from one another. Antique surfaces meet polished steel planes, and familiar forms give way to altered proportions and unexpected structures.
The artist’s process mirrors the accumulation of cultural layers. Instead of isolating tradition from modernity, or nature from industry, Kim allows these forces to pass through one another. Memory operates alongside physical sensation, with neither taking priority.
Traditionally tied to function, comfort, and domestic order, furniture in Metamorphosis shifts away from fixed utility. Kim treats each object as a site of reconsideration. Chairs, tables, and cabinets lose their singular purpose and adopt new roles shaped by their altered structure and material composition.
The exhibition frames function as something fluid rather than predetermined. Kim proposes that use emerges through relationship. When materials with different histories share space, they invite reassessment. An object may lose one role and gain another, or remain open to interpretation altogether. This openness forms the core of Metamorphosis.
Byungsub Kim presents furniture as a living record of time rather than a closed system of function. By allowing materials from different eras to shape one another, Metamorphosis offers a measured reflection on change, continuity, and the possibilities that arise when objects remain open to redefinition.
