Export Loop (I), 2026
Export loop (1) is a score written by Andrea Soto right before Valie Export’s passing, sourcing from Soto’s work Multitude (1), for VALIE EXPORT: EMBODIED at MAK Center for Art and Architecture in 2024. The score was shared and transmitted in text form to Yun Lee, who reinterprets it in the environment they are placed in: a parking lot of Beacon Arts Building in Inglewood, CA.
“Metal light cement flesh
Metal light cement flesh
Metal light cement flesh
Metal light cement flesh
Attempt to strip away from power and gendered structures
Metal light cement flesh ”
Transmitted from body to text and then from text to body across the country, Yun Lee interprets the score by applying their own research in forming a non-imposing physical relationship with the material as a human, a process that starts from physically positioning oneself in parallel to the material, metal.
Here is a transcription of notes on Yun’s choreographic research from the summer of 2026.
Questions were posed by choreographer Miguel Gutierrez in his workshop titled, you have form you asshole.
What do I want to bring to my work?
I make performance at a place
already loaded with meaning
that has had it’s uses
as a container for other activities
What do I want to bring to my work?
Pleasure pleasure pleasure in the body, in being together, finding support in the other
transformation that is felt by
the performing collective and is
observed, listened to, and
amplified
by choreographic decisions
Amplification of selected shifts
Letting shifts build, rather than forcing change
There’s punk in attempting at the poetic
A poem rather than a novel,
A landscape rather than a diorama
Let the properties of the
material speak for themselves in parallel
to humans, what do the humans
feel against it?
pleasure? frustration? how do we work through them? the affect?
Taking responsibility in the use of the material
Being moved by non-human forces, such as gravity, weight, vectors
Constant rediscovering of softness through the interacting
with material with different textures and properties
(Against rigidity, practice adaptability)
Lose
Losing
you guys win,
I lose.
Then what?
All film photography by Danny Young
All photos and videos from rehearsals and performance by Jade Solus
Surrender
all things industrial
that defies industriousness
going with what the shape suggests
giving in & resisting
working with pacing
I listen to the material already telling me how to engage with it
l am yielding to the rules embedded in
the thing rather than devising a plan on how I can relate to it
—>being in parallel — non imposing <—
[yielding]
[losing]
(not devising a plan/rules) —> listening
observing the curves that were inviting me in
Distill Methods from this in a form of a LIST
— yield
— lose
— accept
— be in parallel
— relate
— accept invitation
— notice change —> let it transform
— be surprised
What is your research?
Forming a non-imposing physical
relationship with the material, the other
that starts from physically positioning
oneself in parallel to the material
— resist
— profess
— win
— reject
— be complete, know completely
— be overpowering
— ignore
— chew out
— keep going
Who is in this work? Ancestors? Who are you repelling?
인의지신 칠정 Grandma Young Hi’s research on Neo-Confucianist’s values: 4 morals and 7 affects
working with desires to consider what is moral
workers working outside on the street, while I’m working on the performance
Karen Barad has this theory that when you engage in dynamic movement you lose sensitivity in return
Still retaining interest in dynamism
인의지신 칠정 Grandma Young Hi’s research on Neo-Confucianist’s values: 4 morals and 7 affects
working with desires to consider what is moral
workers working outside on the street, while I’m working on the performance
Karen Barad has this theory that when you engage in dynamic movement you lose sensitivity in return
Still retaining interest in dynamism
Did you try your piece full out?
— Yes. Spending time with the material is rehearsal.
What did you learn from performing?
— That it’s not about showing (but yes yes yes to sharing)