Christine Sun Kim Recognized as 2026 MacArthur Fellow

It's morning in Brooklyn and noon in Berlin for Christine Sun Kim, a California-born artist who has called Berlin home for over a decade. Our conversation is taking place at an early hour, but it's clear that Kim is already making waves with her recent recognition as a 2026 MacArthur Fellow.

This prestigious honor comes on the heels of several notable exhibitions, including a career survey at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and shows in Seoul and Luxembourg. Kim's work spans multiple mediums, from drawing and performance to video and large-scale murals, all of which explore the politics of sound with humor and insight.

Kim's art examines how language shapes our social world, often using a pointed and humorous approach. Her recent exhibitions have been well-received, but they're not the only signs of her creative output. In addition to her visual work, Kim has also been working on a book that brings together thousands of vernacular images.

Published by Primary Information in September, "Deaf Material is a comprehensive collection that showcases over 600 images across nearly 400 pages. This project is the result of years of research and collecting, with Kim gathering visual traces of deaf life to create a unique and powerful resource.

Kim's project is not without its complexities, particularly when it comes to the appropriation of language and symbols by those outside the Deaf community.

She has expressed ambivalence about how certain phrases have become ubiquitous in popular culture, often stripped of their original context and meaning.

The artist also makes appearances throughout the book, photographed in various settings that reflect her connection to the Deaf experience. These images include a shot of her standing outside Ability Plaza in London, as well as one taken in front of Alexander Graham Bell's apartment building.

Kim's use of photographs from everyday life adds a personal touch to the project, highlighting both the mundane and the thought-provoking aspects of living with Deafness.

The photographs Kim has collected for the book are not just any images, but rather a specific type of documentation - pictures of abandoned schools for the deaf. These shuttered institutions have been captured by a photographer who was initially working on a project to document their buildings, logos, and jerseys.

Kim's interest in this project led her to contribute her own photographs from her travels, which sparked an idea that eventually fell through - collaborating with the photographer on a joint book project. However, when approached again later by Primary Information's James Hoff, Kim had already formed a clear vision for what she wanted to create.

To gather the extensive collection of images in the book, Kim sought out contributions from others as well. This collaborative effort was driven not only by her personal experiences but also by a desire to shed light on broader issues affecting the Deaf community.

Kim emphasizes that the Deaf community is facing significant challenges and expresses concern about advances in gene therapy, which she sees as a worrying echo of America's history of eugenics.

Kim's experiences growing up as a deaf person were shaped by the support and resources available in her community. She recalls feeling comfortable in her surroundings, surrounded by other deaf individuals who shared similar experiences. This sense of familiarity was partly due to having a deaf sister and forming relationships with deaf friends and boyfriends.

However, as Kim began to explore how her identity as a deaf person could be reflected in her art, she found herself facing new challenges. Moving to Berlin in 2013 provided some distance from the world she knew, but it also meant navigating unfamiliar cultural norms and expectations. In Germany, Kim encountered bureaucratic hurdles when attempting to access benefits for deaf individuals.

To receive discounted transit and other benefits, Kim is required to prove her deafness annually, a process that has become an annual ritual in her life. Her husband humorously likens this experience to attending high school reunions. This administrative burden highlights the ongoing need for deaf people to justify their disability, even in countries with more progressive attitudes towards accessibility.

Kim's artistic journey was also influenced by her graduate studies at Bard College, where she earned a second MFA in sound and music. During this time, she exhibited her work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. However, Kim recalls being encouraged to express more anger in her art due to her deafness, a suggestion that left her questioning what hearing people expected from her as an artist.

As Kim continued to explore her deaf identity in her work, she began to create art that reflected her frustrations with everyday experiences.

Degrees of Deaf Rage is a series of charcoal and oil-pastel drawings that map frustration through mathematical angles, providing a unique visual representation of the emotions that arise from inaccessible situations. The series tackles various aspects of life, including education, travel, interpreting, institutions, and the art world, injecting deadpan humor into what could otherwise be overwhelming instances of inaccessibility.

The use of acute and obtuse angles to convey different levels of rage was a deliberate choice by Kim, allowing her to visually represent the nuances of frustration that often accompany encounters with inaccessible environments. For instance, an Uber driver who chooses to call instead of texting would warrant an acute angle, while a hotel fire alarm without strobe lights demands a right angle.

In 2020, Kim took her talent to the Super Bowl, signing the national anthem and America the Beautiful" on one of America's biggest stages.

Christine Sun Kim's work as a digital archivist at W.W.Norton gave her valuable experience in preserving and collecting information. She now applies this expertise to the images she has gathered over the years, making them accessible online for others to find and share.

Kim emphasizes the importance of circulating information freely, rather than relying on algorithms that can influence what we see. This concern is personal for her, as she notes that her Korean immigrant parents' social media feeds are vastly different from hers due to customized content recommendations. She wonders if this customization has unintended consequences for the Deaf community.

By making deaf material more accessible online, Kim aims to provide a reminder of the importance of accessibility features like captions, which may be turned off by hearing viewers but are crucial for those who rely on them. Her work highlights the complexities of visibility and its role in shaping our understanding of the world around us.