이 기쁨 : Joy Lee

I’m a South Korean dancer, choreographer, and movement director in New York City working within/across contemporary, house, jazz, hip-hop, and ballet styles and traditions. I was a contemporary dance major at Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul, a member of the Seoul-based dance collectives Magnolia and Gravity Cultureground, and a dance teacher at Seoul Tanz Station and Pas Dance Studio before coming to the US in 2019 to expand my dance repertoire. In NYC, I’ve participated in a range of solo and collaboration projects, including short films, modeling, visual art exhibitions, and musical performances. In 2017, I danced for a humanitarian campaign by the International Committee of the Red Cross, and in April 2023, I was selected for YSL’s Push the Boundaries Prize, both milestones for me as an independent artist.

Currently, I’m focused of developing a dance film, which would formally combine my love for music, visual art, storytelling, and (of course) dance, into a lasting artwork. As a dancer, I’m always aware that my body is aging/changing. As a choreographer, I’ve also always been interested in film’s unique ability to preserve and expand time. I want to see how dance and film as mediums can work together to capture and release moments. How does time, through art, become timeless? How does movement, through film, become an object? These are some of the questions that I hope to explore.