Hong's work is research-led, revisiting specific historical moments in
South Korea and reinterpreting them. She is interested in how art can have a political role, particularly from a female perspective, as South Korean history has evolved under authoritative male-dominated regimes until very recently.[7] In her practice, Hong examines unwritten history,
collective memory and undervalued cultural practices, politics of intuition and the practice of ‘equality’. Most of her works deal with those people whom society regards as minorities, and she often uses methods that are not usually associated with high art.[8] Hong works in a range of disciplines –
drawing,
embroidery painting,
installation and
site-specificperformance.[9] For her performance projects, she
collaborates with local communities, dancers, musicians and choreographers and the public.[10]
In 2015, curator
Fatoş Üstek commissioned her to create a new work for fig-2 at the
ICA London,[11] resulting in the ambitious, very complex, but at the same time very strong and resonating piece In Her Dream[12], a collaboration with
Delfina Foundation and
The Korean Cultural Centre. Hong combined
baroque aesthetics with Korean
Shaman music for a performance based on a detailed study of induced violence and isolation in the everyday lives of women from various countries of affiliation.[13]
The Moon's Trick, Hong's solo exhibition at the Korean Cultural Centre UK in 2017[14][15][16][17][18] was part of Korea-UK/2017-18.[19] It later travelled to Exeter Phoenix.[20] The same year, Echoes, commissioned by Venice Agendas, launched at the
Venice Biennale in May 2017 and continued to run in Margate at
Turner Contemporary,[21] Folkestone and Spike Island Bristol in December 2017. Voluntary participants were invited through open call to respond to a soundtrack consisting of a compilation of political statements by public figures ranging from Donald Trump to Michael Moore.
In her solo show We Where at PKM Gallery in Seoul in 2022, "Hong attends to the subject of “
communities” that become forgotten in contemporary society. She recognizes the loss of a communal space that
premodern folks believed to be real, i.e.,
sacred areas in which the spirits of living organisms including animals, humans, and plants could communicate through a natural connection, and wishes for the recovery of such relationships of equality."[22][23] For the group exhibition Scoring the Word, Hong created Meta-hierarchical Exercise, a series of nine improvised group performances with 24 embroidered choreography-scores, presented at the
Seoul Museum of Art in November 2022.[24]
5100:Pentagon, created for the
Gwangju Biennale 2014, was performed again at the
Parque de la Memoria in
Buenos Aires in December 2022, with local volunteers, as part of Mitos del futuro próximo curated by Sofía Dourron and Javier Villa.[25] The movements of the performers are inspired by video footage of the
Gwangju massacre in South Korea in May 1980, found in the archives of the democratic movement in the city of Gwangju.
Lubaina Himid included Hong's embroidered image Burning Love[26] in the touring exhibition Found Cities, Lost Objects: Women in the City, curated in partnership with the
Arts Council Collection in 2022/23.[27]
Ring of Animals, Young In Hong's first solo exhibition in
Belgium is shown at Kunsthal Extra City in
Antwerp in early 2023.[28] The same year, she produced a new work for Threads - breathing stories into materials, co-curated by textile artist
Alice Kettle at
Arnolfini in Bristol. 2023, Young In Hong received the Spike Island Commission for South West-based Artists. The resulting work was presented in Spike Island’s galleries in spring 2024 in the show Five Acts.[29][30][31]