This body of work is my way of looking closely at the art world ecosystem and what it means to be an "artist" today. I realized that making art isn't just about the final piece; it involves a lot of other things, like role-playing, social networking, and following unwritten rules, things that feel like a "working model."

The projects here act like mirrors, reflecting the confusion, exhaustion, and sometimes absurdity that artists face in their professional lives.

On Truth and Records (Pretend): This started with a simple question: If a performance wasn't right in front of me, are the records I see true? Could I fake an artwork's history? The Pretend projects deliberately blur the line between real and fictional to question the proof of an artwork’s existence. I want to see if something can gain a special kind of "truth" just by being pretended. It challenges how we are used to trusting what we see in art.

On the Fatigue of Socializing (Artist Socialization): I noticed that art openings often turn into big social events. Artists are expected to constantly promote themselves and their work; it’s treated as part of the job. But soon, conversations drift from art to private life. In works like Socializing is Part of An Artist's Work and Social Fatigue, I use the exhibition format to play with this situation. Whether it's making other artists into "exhibits" or using a deflated, exhausted doll to represent a tired artist, I'm showing the emotional cost of this "professional socializing." It makes us feel like staff standing behind a counter, totally drained.

On Boundaries and Who Decides (Art Outsider): What counts as art? Who gets to define it? The Art Outsider and A Pair of Glasses projects directly test the edges of the art world. I put a sign that says "I’M AN ART OUTSIDER" outside art spaces and let it tell its own story of "entering" the art world. I also test a normal pair of glasses—once they were mistaken for art and covered by the media—to see if galleries would treat them as a valuable artwork. These experiments all point to the same question: Is art's value created by the artist, or is it given by the institutions and the context?

In short, the Being An Artist: A Working Model series is not trying to give answers. It aims to put the hidden, awkward, and draining systems of the art world out in the open. I hope the audience will look at these works and rethink: What does it really mean to "make art" in this environment today? And why are so many of us feeling so tired?