Path of Light

Fired at high temperature, clay changes permanently and hardens. Earthenware can be fired in an open fire at around 600°C and is normally fired below 1,200°C; unglazed, it lets water through. Stoneware is fired at about 1,100–1,300°C and is dense and watertight. Porcelain, usually made with kaolin, is fired at 1,200–1,400°C and is hard and slightly translucent. Glaze is a glassy coating on the surface that makes a piece watertight and also decorates it. The earliest way of shaping was by hand: pinching, joining slabs, or building up coils of clay ring by ring; throwing on the potter's wheel came later. On the Korean peninsula, Goryeo celadon developed the sanggam inlay technique in the early 12th century, and in the Joseon period buncheong ware and white porcelain led.

Look closely at the surface: is the glaze glossy or matte? Where it is thin, does the colour of the clay show through?

• Ceramics: clay and kiln 陶瓷：泥與窯火→Same topic in Taipei

Installations are often made for a particular site, and visitors move within them, so where your body stands is part of the looking. The materials can be everyday objects, fabric, video, or sound, and a work may be taken down after the exhibition and never shown again. The term first appears in writing in 1969; earlier, in 1958, Allan Kaprow called the indoor spaces he transformed “Environments.” Do Ho Suh's Seoul Home (1999) is a life-size replica of his childhood home in Korea in polyester fabric and silk on thin metal rods; it folds up for transport, and each time it moves to a new city, that city's name is added to the title.

Look from several places, outside, inside, and from a distance, and notice how the light, the sound, and your path change.

• Installation art 裝置藝術→Same topic in Taipei
• Installation Art インスタレーション→Same topic in Tokyo