4'44"

The corresponding new book and record 4'44" by South Korean artist Jiyoung Wi is presented as 'sound fiction' - a multi-layered account featuring unknown narrators in differing dialects. The intimate and surreal novel follows a protagonist who grapples with the world and her own fractured psyche - tracing her matriarchal lineage and the relationship between her body and illness.

The novel's title appropriates John Cage's 4'33" by extending its duration with an extra 11 seconds. Some suggest that the 273 seconds of Cage's composition refer to -273°C—absolute zero, the point where all molecular motion stops. By adding this fraction of time, Wi creates an interval to reflect on a concept that mirrors the act of letter-writing, which involves both the self and the other, or the recipient. This manipulation of time also evokes cultural symbolism, as the number four is often associated with death in many Asian cultures. Combining the silence of 4 minutes and 33 seconds with a brief yet charged speculative moment, Wi invites a meditation on externality—on what lies beyond the self—at the threshold of death.

The environmental sounds were recorded in real-world locations chosen in accordance with each of the (sub)conscious accounts of the narrator(s), grounding the text in both a tangible and fictional setting. Guided by the four minutes and forty-four seconds, the field recordings reflect a subjective experience of time, while preserving the anonymity of the recorder (Wi) to ensure that the sounds exist solely within the narrative.

Jiyoung Wi (b. 1990) is a musician and fiction writer based in The Hague and Seoul. Wi's multidisciplinary practice explores the narrative possibilities that emerge from non-image-based mediums. She has been developing a series of 'sound fiction' works that focuses on the interaction between sound and writing. Wi also devises improvisational performances for untrained bodies, using Western instruments and electronics to dramatize the conflicts against the noise genre, engaging with Eurocentric signifiers. Notable publications and albums include Woman × Electro × Music (co-author, Geulhangari, KR, 2023) and Accept All Cookies (ENXPL, 2024, Germany/USA). Wi has performed at prestigious venues such as Volksbühne (Germany), Les Siestes (France), Worm (Netherlands), and The Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp (Belgium); and has also contributed as a sound producer in exhibitions and performances held at the Sharjah Biennial (UAE), National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Gwacheon (KR), SeMA (KR), Ilmin Museum of Art (KR), Oil Tank Culture Park (KR).