Hye Rim Lee Swan Lake (still) 2025. 3D animation. 3D generalist: Steven Stringer. Courtesy of the artist
Forthcoming
Hye Rim Lee: Swan Lake
2 August –
23 November 2025
An immersive, dreamlike digital reinterpretation of the classic Tchaikovsky ballet.
An immersive, dreamlike digital reinterpretation of the classic Tchaikovsky ballet.
Shimmering swans glide across a misty, dreamlike sapphire lake in this shifting, immersive reinterpretation of Tchaikovsky’s nineteenth-century ballet by Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland-based artist Hye Rim Lee. But when a menacing player emerges to shatter the lovers’ bond, their too-brief reverie dissolves into whirling disarray.
Born in Seoul, South Korea, into a family steeped in music and the performing arts, Lee draws on more than two decades of international experience in the creation of this emotionally resonant new work.
Her distinctive choreographic animation becomes a tale of longing, loss and renewal – a multisensory celebration of performance and evocative digital storytelling.
My Gallery
Curator:
Ken Hall
Exhibition number: 1177
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Hye Rim Lee
The laptop fires up and a dreamlike virtual world materialises. Exquisite peacocks – glassy black, ethereal white – emerge on a moonlit stage, framed by icy blue branching patterns. A cast of swans glide through a luminous, rippling lake in measured arcs, their movements both urgent and graceful. In other scenes, two royal lovers – bound by fate, divided by unseen forces – circle one another, mirroring gestures of longing and hesitation.