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Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles

  • Exhibitions
    • Current
    • Upcoming
    • Past
  • Calendar
  • Learning
    • Artist Residency
    • Bookshelf Residency
    • Digital Projects
    • Public Programs
    • Schools & Community
    • Special Projects
  • Visit
  • About
    • Staff
    • Governance
    • Press
    • Partnerships
    • Opportunities
    • Annual Report
  • Shop
  • Get Involved
    • Membership
    • Patron Groups
    • Institutional Support
    • Artist Edition Series
    • Sustainability
    • Corporate
  • Donate
Yellow Pages
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Back To Exhibitions
Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back February 11, 2023 ➽ January 14, 2024
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Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back February 11, 2023 ➽ January 14, 2024

Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back

Outdoor Projects

ICA LA is pleased to present a new large-scale mural commissioned for the museum’s façade by the Berlin-based American artist Christine Sun Kim (b. 1980, Orange County, CA). Working across the mediums of drawing, performance, experimental sound, video, and large-scale murals, Kim’s work engages with the limits and possibilities of language—be it spoken, signed, or scripted. Often referencing musical scores, infographics, and emojis, her singular visual lexicon brings together sarcastic humor and incisive critique to illuminate the systems of power and ideology embedded in oral communications and investigate the complex realities of Deaf culture.

Titled Bounce Back (2023), this new site-specific mural builds on Kim’s recent body of work that focuses on debt—signed in ASL by one index finger tapping the open palm of the other. Depending on elements such as the directionality of the open palm, the force of the finger’s impact, and other non-manual cues like facial and bodily expression, one sign can carry multiple meanings. In this case, the word for “debt” can take on various nuances that indicate the type, severity, or urgency of the debt, or even allow the sign to slip into adjacent meanings like “owe” or “afford.” Creating her own kind of ASL notation, Kim makes reference to the tapping finger through the traces of its movements, incorporating into the drawing a double bouncing line reminiscent of those used in old cartoons or comic books to indicate motion. Moving from hand to hand, the bouncing lines underscore the relational aspect of debt, asking the viewer to examine what exactly is owed? And to whom? Offering a poignant meditation on systemic inequity and shared experience under debt, Kim’s mural asks us to consider our collective responsibility in contributing to the layers of financial, historical, social, and emotional debt that structure and define everyday life.

Images
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Installation view, Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back, Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, February 11–September 15, 2023. Photo: Jeff McLane/ICA LA
Related Events
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Credits & Sponsors
About the Artist
February 11, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 6 PM
Open House at ICA LA
Openings
Talks & Panels
Spring2023openhouse v1

February 18, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
March 11, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
April 08, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
May 13, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
June 24, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
July 08, 2023, 2023, 3 PM - 4:30 PM
Intro to ASL
Workshops
Asl square

August 09, 2023, 2023, 7 PM - 9 PM
Art21 Screening + Discussion: Christine Sun Kim
Exhibition Programs
Screenings
Talks & Panels
Csk bounceback

Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) Deaf Culture Tip Sheet
Hands & Voices Deaf Culture and Community
The ASL App Deaf Culture FAQ
Deaf Power (co-founded by Christine) Resources Page
ARTransmissions: Christine Sun Kim
Art21 Educators’ Guide: Friends & Strangers
Art21: Friends and Strangers
Art21 Screening + Discussion: Christine Sun Kim

Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back is organized by Amanda Sroka, Senior Curator, with Caroline Ellen Liou, Curatorial Assistant.

Commissioned by Palatine Capital Partners through the LA County Department of Arts and Culture Public Art in Private Development program.

ICA LA is supported by the Curator’s Council and Fieldwork Council.

Christine Sun Kim (b. 1980, Orange County, CA) is an American artist based in Berlin. Kim’s practice considers how sound operates in society, deconstructing the politics of sound and exploring how oral languages operate as social currency. Musical notation, written language, infographics, American Sign Language (ASL), the use of the body, and strategically deployed humor are all recurring elements in her practice. Working across drawing, performance, video and large-scale murals, Kim explores her relationship to spoken languages, to her built and social environments, and to the world at large. Kim has exhibited and performed internationally, including at the Queens Museum, New York (2022); the Drawing Center, New York (2022); the Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt (2021); MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge (2020); Whitney Biennial, New York (2019); Art Institute of Chicago (2018); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2017); Berlin Biennale (2016); Shanghai Biennale (2016); and the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013), among others, with works held in numerous prominent collections. Kim is an inaugural awardee of the Ford and Mellon Foundations’ Disabilities Future Fellowship, a TED Senior Fellowship, an MIT Media Lab Fellowship, and the 2022 Prix International d’Art Contemporain of the Fondation Prince Pierre de Monaco. She is represented by François Ghebaly, Los Angeles and White Space Beijing.
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STATUS ID Title Start date End date Featured image Last updated
Active Published
468 Sandra Vásquez de la Horra: The Awake Volcanoes 2025-10-11 2026-03-01 1:47pm Apr 14, 2025 Page
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336 Will Rawls: [siccer] 2025-04-05 2025-08-31
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369 Jackie Castillo: Through the Descent, Like the Return 2025-04-05 2025-08-31
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501 J&L Books: Reading Room 2025-04-05 2025-08-31
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402 An Incessant Unknowability: An Archive of Protest Inspired Typography and Its Open Source Uses 2024-12-04 2025-03-02
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1:18pm Apr 23, 2025 Page
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303 Agency of Assets x SUAY
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2024-10-05 2024-11-17
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137 Scientia Sexualis 2024-10-05 2025-03-02
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270 Demian DinéYazhi' 2024-10-05 2025-08-24
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3:08pm Oct 16, 2024 Page
Active Pageless
435 Reading is Transcendental 2024-10-05 2026-03-01 3:19pm Mar 04, 2025 Page
Active Published
237 Kathryn Andrews 2024-09-07 2024-11-17
K andrews dsf9640 corrected hires
1:15pm Oct 28, 2024 Page
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204 Returning 2024-06-05 2024-07-28
Returning_Exhibition Image__01.JPG
1:51pm Mar 03, 2025 Page
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171 Ooga Boogie, cha cha cha! 2024-04-10 2024-06-02
Ooga Boogie, cha cha cha!_Exhibition Image_1.JPG
4:44pm Jul 03, 2024 Page
Active Published
138 Kima Ten Years 2024-02-10 2024-04-07
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4:04pm Jul 03, 2024 Page
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133 Scratching at the Moon 2024-02-10 2024-07-28
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4:36pm Dec 04, 2024 Page
Active Published
136 Foreign Investments (Bottarga in Costa Mesa) 2024-02-10 2024-07-28
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5:11pm Jul 30, 2024 Page
Active Published
132 Barbara T. Smith: Proof 2023-10-07 2024-01-14
Installation view, _Barbara T. Smith: Proof_, Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, October 7, 2023–January 14, 2024. Photo: Jeff McLane/ICA LA.
9:33am Mar 05, 2025 Page
Active Published
134 Infinite Rehearsal with Chris Emile and No)one. Art House 2023-10-07 2024-01-14
Icala(10 10) 055
3:47pm Nov 22, 2023 Page
Active Published
135 Data (beta): the labor of looking 2023-10-07 2024-01-14
Icala(10 10) 061
2:51pm Aug 12, 2024 Page
Active Published
129 Trương Công Tùng 2023-06-10 2023-09-10
Tct 1
1:34pm Sep 13, 2023 Page
Active Published
130 Carmen Argote: I won’t abandon you, I see you, we are safe 2023-06-10 2023-09-10
Icala 2023 06 12 042
2:40pm Aug 17, 2023 Page
Active Published
131 Alberta Whittle: between a whisper and a cry 2023-06-10 2023-09-10
Aw 1
10:44am Jul 29, 2023 Page
Active Published
126 Milford Graves: Fundamental Frequency 2023-02-11 2023-05-14
Icala 2023 02 14 039
10:40am May 09, 2023 Page
Active Published
127 Jacqueline Kiyomi Gork 2023-02-11 2023-05-14
Icala 001
1:14pm May 04, 2023 Page
Active Published
128 Christine Sun Kim: Bounce Back 2023-02-11 2024-01-14
Icala 2023 02 14 001
11:42am Feb 19, 2025 Page
Active Published
91 Rebecca Morris: 2001–2022 2022-10-01 2023-01-15
Image of exhibition introduction text, Rebecca Morris painting hands in the background.
1:10pm Apr 01, 2024 Page
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