Visiting the Open Wound at the Tate Modern in London

THE HUGE TURBINE Hall that forms the entrance and centrepiece of London’s Tate Modern is used for temporary exhibitions. Until 16 March 2025, the Turbine Hall is home to a somewhat weird but visually fascinating art installation, “Open Wound, created by Mire Lee, who was born in South Korea in 1988.

At first sight, it seems that discarded skins of various shapes and sizes are hanging from the ceiling. Standing on the floor beneath some of them is a tall tower that carries what looks like a piece of ageing industrial machinery suspended from an overhead crane. This rotates slowly while drops of liquid fall from it onto some of the skins and elongated sausage-like pieces of fabric before dropping into a pool on a large piece of stretched material. Set in the lofty, rather inhuman, Turbine Hall, this installation made me feel as if I were inside an enormous abattoir.

Apart from being intriguing to look at, I was not sure what to make of it. The Tate’s website noted:

“Lee believes ‘being moved is the strongest thing you can experience through art.’ Reflecting on our current historical moment, Open Wound conjures ‘the mood of a deserted construction site’, an atmosphere of ‘futility and melancholy, where something has started to wither.’ Despite this, the collective ‘skins’ of the living factory suggest an eerie solidarity. They mutate the Hall into an intimate space of ‘dream and distant memory’, in which such feelings can be shared.”

Well, having seen the work in the Turbine Hall, these words made sense. I am not sure that I would recommend people going out of their way to see this installation, but if you had other reasons to visit the Tate Modern, then do spend a few minutes looking at Mire Lee’s creation.