Introducing... Claire Sunho Lee

Claire Sunho Lee is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher based in London and Seoul. Lee’s practice engages with seeing various meanings within one “reality” by questioning acceptable norms. She sees “normal” as what one knows based on the perspective(s) they have rather than being defined in one way or another, thus having multiple meanings at the same time. She often thinks about the ways of “being” and how we exist in the world individually and collectively. Lee experiments with this idea through the concept of “control and surrender” in everyday life settings and suggests new perspectives to look at the familiar. Through the means of rules, logic, and algorithms, she examines psychological complications, human conditions, trauma, and more. 

Lee received her BFA degree in Photography and Imaging from the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University in 2017 and received her MA degree in Photography from the Royal College of Art in 2021. Her recent achievements include a group exhibition at Noorderlicht Photo Festival, V.O Curations, Cromwell Place, and PEP (Photographic Exploration Project) and features on ArtDoc Photography Magazine, TOFU Magazine, VOGUE Italia and Musée Magazine, Grand Prix from IMA-Next, and shortlist from Lumen Prize. She recently gave artist talks for Arts & Health Hub and Bethlem Gallery.

Project

During the fellowship, I will further develop Tell Me What I'm Remembering - a multidisciplinary project that explores the fragility and fluidity of memory through the lens of a hidden childhood illness. By engaging with the UCL community, particularly through the Centre for Health Humanities and the Institute of Advanced Studies, I aim to provide fresh insights into the psychological, philosophical, and ethical layers of memory, illness, and care.  My work, attuned to the theme of "Care and Distress," interrogates the affective dimensions of fragmented memories, the ethics of caregiving and withholding medical truths, and the visceral, sensory experiences of illness and its lingering aftermath. I am particularly interested to explore how a personal narrative of a concealed illness can resonate with broader cultural and medical discourses, opening up new perspectives on the ways in which we construct, distort, and preserve memories in the context of health and trauma. By uncovering layers of personal and collective memory that often remain inaccessible, and by engaging with the lived experience of health and care, I look forward to working with researchers and collaborators to expand conceptual frameworks for understanding memory as a narrative-constructing process shaped by social, cultural, and medical contexts. Through these interdisciplinary encounters, I hope to demonstrate creative practice as a powerful tool for uncovering, interrogating, and transforming our experiences of illness and healing.