An Gayoung (b. 1985) has been creating works that combine elements of art and gaming, focusing on the cultures that emerge at the boundary between on- and offline worlds and the real-world issues they generate. While her practice is rooted in media art that employs the interactive nature of games, her core inquiry centers on the various forms of inequality embedded in digital environments—particularly the experiences of women within them—and the search for alternatives. 

Grounded in these questions, the artist adapts game-based worldviews and modes of storytelling to construct alternative narratives.

An Gayoung’s work is grounded in virtual worlds constructed through the technical medium of game engines. Within these game-like environments, intricately layered with various interactive mechanisms, the viewer becomes an active participant, exploring the virtual space as the work unfolds. 

This approach became fully apparent in The Hermes’s Box (2016), a game in which the player, embodying the mythological messenger Hermes, is tasked with transporting a mysterious box. Taking on the first-person perspective of the protagonist, the viewer navigates a labyrinthine network riddled with viruses and glitches by manipulating a joystick. The only way for Hermes to escape this maze is to collect three hidden box-shaped items scattered within the virtual world.

In addition to the online game component, viewers can also participate in an analog game, taking on missions to help Hermes find an exit from the maze. As they carry a physical box and move through the exhibition space, sensors track their movements, which in turn alter the terrain within the on-screen environment. 

Crossing between online and offline realms to complete the mission, Hermes eventually escapes the maze and delivers the boxes to the goddess Hash (#). However, by the time the journey ends, the contents of the boxes have been transformed into a collection of internet rumors accumulated during the maze’s traversal.

Through this work, the artist metaphorically illustrates how information is transformed and transmitted within internet networks. Just as our seemingly trivial actions online are converted into data and contribute to the creation of larger bodies of big data, our behaviors—however small—have a subtle but real impact on the world. 

In The Hermes’s Box, An Gayoung constructs a world where real events intersect with datafied texts and images, forming a complex, multilayered reality in which these elements penetrate one another. Within this space, viewers unconsciously participate in the process of information distortion, thereby reenacting the uneasy realities of today’s internet networks.

In Worlding (2018), the artist explored the theme of "world-making" as a means of seeking coexistence within a world of uncertainty, unfolding it through a fantastical simulation game. This work experiments with the ecological balance of an artificial environment that shifts according to the power of one’s gaze. 

Characters—once buried underground as tiny creatures—engage in dialogue by adopting each other’s perspectives. Through this process, they evolve or become extinct, gradually giving rise to an emergent and ever-changing world.

The title “Worlding” combines the word “world” with the suffix “-ing,” suggesting not a static or fixed world but one that is continuously in motion—constantly evolving and being made. According to the artist, Worlding shifts its focus from reason to emotion, from competition and growth to coexistence, from fixed states to unpredictable situations, and from powerful heroes to small, autonomous agents. 

As players, viewers gradually learn the rules of the game and work to restore balance within the world. With its open-ended and temporary structure, Worlding allows for free exploration and navigation, enabling each player to generate their own unique narrative within the game.

An Gayoung later produced the video work 21C Cyber Body Liberation Manifesto (2020), based on the text of the same title (21C Cyber Body Liberation Manifesto, 2019), written as part of a feminist study group called labB. The work questions whether the ideals of 1990s feminists—who dreamed of bodily liberation within networked virtual spaces—remain relevant today. 

According to the foundational text, the answer is rather skeptical. The artist argues that what was once imagined as a realm of freedom and hope has now collapsed: today’s virtual space enumerates and exposes various aspects of our being—faces, bodies, skin, behaviors, voices, texts, and personal data—transforming them into objects of desire and eroding the sense of safety once associated with cyberspace.

In the video work 21C Cyber Body Liberation Manifesto, An Gayoung reanimates video game characters—now listed on open-source platforms and objectified as commodities of desire—as cyborg zombies, envisioning the liberation of bodies within virtual reality. Here, the artist intervenes in the traditionally non-subjective roles of these characters—who are often mere objects of desire or observation—by embedding exceptional codes and dialects into their otherwise conventional in-game behaviors.

Drawing from the legacy of the Guerrilla Girls, Donna Haraway, and VNS Matrix, An reconfigures language found in xenofeminism, feminist game theory, and queer game studies. Through this, she casts a kind of spell intended to disrupt the gender-biased ecosystems of gaming culture. In doing so, the hybridized bodies—blending action and command—traverse online and offline terrains through a performative dynamics of movement, gaining political resonance in the process.

Meanwhile, An Gayoung’s ongoing project KIN in the Shelter (2019-) is a science fiction worlding simulation game that questions the potential for companionship across different species situated at the intersections of sociocultural, technological, and artistic/life boundaries. Set in a post-apocalyptic future shaped by scientific and technological collapse, the virtual world is inhabited by NPCs (Non-Player Characters) such as Mei, a cloned dog; Joon, an outdated robot; and July, a radiation-exposed laborer. Players form relationships with these characters and progress through the game. 

An deliberately positions these marginalized beings not at the periphery of gameplay but as autonomous agents capable of living out their own lives without significant intervention from players. Drawing inspiration from the life simulation game The Sims, the artist allows the characters to move and act based on their individual tendencies and free will, enabling them to engage in the everyday on their own terms.

The artist focuses on the lives of beings marginalized both in conventional game worlds and in reality, allowing player-viewers to observe and subtly intervene in their lives. For instance, players can engage with the NPCs by uncovering their narratives and participating in parts of their relationships, prompting behavioral responses and fostering interaction. 

This intervention by the player-viewer is intentionally passive. By performing small acts—such as closing doors, breaking objects, manipulating weather machines, or hiding balls—or offering gifts like hamburgers, canned pet food, or memory chips, players can gradually adjust their level of intimacy with the NPCs. Through these interactions, players may become kin or enemies with the characters, leading to various possible endings.

Through this work, An Gayoung poses the question of how we might form companion relationships with non-human others—represented by game characters—at a time when the digital ecosystem is undergoing a fundamental shift. According to the artist’s statement, the ultimate task given to the audience in this game is “to listen to the voices of the NPCs as visitors to the shelter and to learn how to respect their autonomous lives.”

In 2022, An Gayoung participated in *c-lab 6.0, a research project by the Coreana Museum of Art, where she presented two works: Dummy Simulation (2022), an online interactive piece, and COSMIC SENSE: XR Simulation for Humankind of the Future (2022), an audience-participatory work utilizing XR (mixed reality) technology in an offline setting. 

Dummy Simulation is a web-based text adventure game in which participants take a brief survey assessing their level of technological dependency. Based on their responses, they are assigned one of sixteen “dummy” robot characters whose traits reflect their results. These dummy robots are androids sent to the fictional planet “Hiion” ahead of humanity to carry out terraforming. Over 300 years, they successfully adapt to the planet and diversify in appearance and function according to its environment.

Meanwhile, COSMIC SENSE: XR Simulation for Humankind of the Future is an XR performance work that invites participants to experience a space journey as passengers en route to the fictional alien planet “Hiion.” Audience members wear VR headsets and are guided through a 10-minute immersive experience that follows the artist’s speculative narrative about future beings who have migrated to a planet similar to Earth. 

The virtual environment presented through the VR device reveals both the sublime beauty of outer space and the haunting reality of Earth—encircled by human-made debris. Constellations formed from the spirits of animals sacrificed for space exploration appear alongside these cosmic vistas. At the end of the performance, participants come to a realization: the floor beneath them is filled with discarded materials such as packing fillers, plastic, scrap wires, and delivery pouches.

COSMIC SENSE: XR Simulation for Humankind of the Future envisions a speculative sci-fi world, yet it sharply reflects urgent contemporary issues such as the hype surrounding the metaverse, rapid technological shifts, and the extinction-driven trajectory of capitalism and accelerationism. Within the VR experience, the audience encounters fragmented or incomplete virtual bodies. 

In the final moment, participants are confronted with their actual, physical presence amid discarded waste materials. This encounter prompts a critical reflection: How prepared are we—individually and collectively—to co-evolve with others, with technology, and with the world?

An Gayoung explores and reimagines the possibilities of coexistence among diverse beings through game-based simulations in which audiences actively participate and experience the world themselves. In both online and offline settings, she summons beings considered as “others” into the virtual bodies she has constructed and reconnects them with contemporary discourse, thereby granting them new narratives.
 
Her works, which embed real-world issues emerging from accelerated technological advancement, resist being dismissed as mere fictional simulations detached from reality—they compel viewers to confront them as part of the present world. 

In this way, while constructing a science-fictional worldview, An prompts us to question our attitudes toward the shared world in which various species live and how we might coexist within rapidly shifting environments.

 “What matters is how the world of simulation changes through audience participation, and what outcomes emerge as a result. The aesthetics of simulation do not pursue a single, linear narrative, but rather allow for different paths to be chosen based on the tendencies of each participant. These choices trigger diverse events and lead to multiple possible endings. Therefore, the role of the artist is to construct the system environment and cast the audience into it as characters.”  (An Gayoung, from an interview for 《Welcome, you connected!》 at the Suwon Museum of Art) 

An Gayoung studied painting at Hongik University and its graduate school, and later majored in Visual Arts at the Graduate School of Communication & Arts at Yonsei University. Her recent solo exhibitions include 《COSMIC SENSE: XR Simulation for Humankind of the Future》 (Coreana Museum of Art, Seoul, 2022), 《Iridium Age: Making New KIN》 (Seongbuk Children’s Museum, 2021), 《KIN in the shelter》 (Artist Residency Temi, Daejeon, 2019), 《Lazy teleport》 (Art Space Jungmiso, Seoul, 2016), and more.
 
She also has participated in numerous group exhibitions, such as 《Project Hashtag 2023》 (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea, Seoul, 2023), Digital Art Festival Taipei 2023 《A-Real Engine》 (Digital Art Center, Taipei, 2023), 《Future Fantastic》 (Art Center Nabi, Seoul, 2022), 《The Most Brilliant Moments for you》 (Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art, Ansan, 2022), 《ONOOOFF》 (Busan Museum of Art, Busan, 2021), and Gwangju Media Art Festival 《Algorithmic Society》 (National Asia Culture Center, Gwangju, 2018). 

An has been selected as an artist-in-residence at the SeMA Nanji Residency (2025), MMCA Residency Changdong (2023), MMCA Residency Goyang (2022), and more. Her works are part of the collections of the Daejeon Museum of Art, the Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art, the Seo-Seoul Museum of Art, the Embassy of the Republic of Korea to the Republic of South Africa.

References

• 안가영, An Gayoung (Artist Website)
• 한국연구, 안가영론: 세계라는 ‘그릇’과 ‘길’을 잃으며 찾는 플레이어들 / 오영진, 2023.09.12
• 디자인정글, 문래예술공장, 안가영 개인전 '헤르메스의 상자', 2016.09.26
• 더스트림, 21C CYBER BODY LIBERATION MANIFESTO, 2022.09.04
• 대전테미예술창작센터, KIN거운 생활 (Artist Residency Temi, KIN in the shelter)
• 코리아나미술관, *c-lab 6.0 프로젝트 X 안가영 “우주감각: 미래 인류를 위한 XR 시뮬레이션” (Coreana Museum of Art, *c-lab 6.0 project X An Gayoung “COSMIC SENSE: XR Simulation for Humankind of the Future”)
• 수원시립미술관, “당신의 하루를 환영합니다” 작가 인터뷰 – 안가영 (Suwon Museum of Art, “Welcome, you connected!” Artist Interview – An Gayoung)