The VH AWARD, organized by Hyundai Motor Group, presented five newly commissioned artworks at the premiere screening exhibition of the 6th VH AWARD in partnership with HEK (House of Electronic Arts) and announced Wendi Yan as the Grand Prix recipient.
On June 17, during the opening reception following a panel discussion with the artists and two jury members, Wendi Yan received the Grand Prix for her work, Dream of Walnut Palaces. The work, a CGI film reimagining knowledge exchange between Asia and Europe in the 18th century, explores the psyche of a fictional Daoist in a Paris lab. It addresses the East-West encounter of epistemic visuality and proposes an alternative to techno-Orientalism.
Yan’s work was commended by the jury for its rigorous research and diasporic lens, presenting an alternative fiction through historically informed speculative worldbuilding and sophisticated use of technology. The jury comprised Christl Baur, Head of Ars Electronica Festival; Sabine Himmelsbach, Director of HEK (House of Electronic Arts); Martin Honzik, Curator and Artist; Sook-Kyung Lee, Director of The Whitworth; and Roderick Schrock, Curator and Executive Director of Eyebeam.
In September 2024, five finalists of the 6th VH AWARD— Lêna Bùi, HUDA x MUNGOMERY, Tianyi Sun & Fiel Guhit, Inhwa Yeom, and Wendi Yan—were announced who had been awarded with grants for the production of new artworks that explore the complexities of contemporary society, triggering new perspectives on history, mythology, identity, and technology. Lêna Bùi’s dream(machine, human) presents a non-linear narrative on humans and machines that can be read as machine-salvaged fragments of human memories or a mythology of human demise and metamorphosis. In Within Tirta, HUDA x MUNGOMERY delves into the mythology of Princess Mandalika and ecological urgency, seeking what we must sacrifice to sustain nature. In the semi-fictional short film 40 Epochs, Tianyi Sun & Fiel Guhit explore the heart of identity, spiritual displacement, and the unseen labor behind the voices that engender human-like technologies. Inhwa Yeom’s War Dance reflects on Asian women’s entanglement between production and reproduction, love and care, drawing from the Korean myth and the natural phenomena of sundog and moondog.
“The VH AWARD evolved as a distinctive platform for exploring transcultural and transhistorical perspectives in the ever-changing landscape of Asia,” said DooEun Choi, Art Director of Hyundai Motor. “The finalists for the 6th VH AWARD invite us to reflect on the emerging context of Asia through the lens of humans and machines, past and future, reality and virtuality, and individual and collective identities.”
The screening exhibition of the 6th VH AWARD continues at the Vision Hall of Hyundai Motor Group University, Mabuk Campus in Yongin, South Korea and Hyundai Motorstudio Beijing, China, running from June 18, followed by a screening event and public program at the Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Austria, in September and another exhibition during Singapore Art Week 2026 in collaboration with the National Arts Council Singapore.
Initiated in 2016, the VH AWARD has been discovering and cultivating emerging media artists who engage with the context of Asia and push the boundaries of audiovisual artworks to reflect on how we understand ourselves and one another in relation to the past, present, and future. The 7th VH AWARD will start an open call in the first half of 2026.
