Taeyoon Choi’s practice is grounded in multiple formats, which include drawings that appeal to the compelling nature of cuteness to address issues of social injustice, as well as installations, collective methodologies, programming and coding, painting, writing, and participatory workshops. In keeping with his long standing concerns surrounding diversity and accessibility in the technological world, his works explore convergences of technology, society, human relationships, and the environment, underscoring the possibilities of solidarity within such interactions. Return to Sender is part of a new series of works in which Choi turns his attention to the environmental implications of new technologies, which he interrogates through research on the social, territorial, and environmental injustices produced by capitalist neoextractivist practices that accompany industrial and ecofriendly technology. The wall painting maps the colonial roads of rare earth minerals that have been extracted from the Global South for use in the production of electronics. Although such products are predominantly produced for markets in the Global North, the discarded ewaste is often sent back to the Global South for disposal. The resulting exploitation of land and bodies threatens multiple ecologies and the reproduction of life, revealing the remnants of colonial structures that continue to inform the contemporary world order.
