Lee Hye-Rim received her second B.F.A. from the University of Auckland, New Zealand in 2002, fifteen years after her first B.F.A. from Ewha Womans University in Seoul, Korea. She gained international attention and popularity following her 2006 solo exhibition at Starkwhite, where she presented her Crystal City series. She continues to achieve steady recognition with breathtaking developments in her animations and photographs. Lee has prominently received a number of awards from the NZ Film Commission and Asia NZ Foundation Fund by the Auckland City CBD Project Public Video Commission. Several of her works are included in public collections of renowned institutions worldwide such as the Hara Museum, Tokyo, The Museum of New Zealand, Saatchi & Saatchi NZ, the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Korea, and many more.
Lee Hye Rim works with a variety of digital media ranging from video animation to digital photography. The main character in both Candyland (Lot 1476) and Crystal City (Lot 1477) feature Toki, a virtual avatar created from computer applications and is a representation of the artist herself. Toki means 'rabbit' in Korean and is connotative of the Playboy Bunny, which signifies the influence of Western ideals of beauty and sexuality. The different parts of Toki's body are presented individually and Lee uses this approach to display each body part as separate entities from each other in order for them to be perceived as singular objects. The abstracted form asserts her distinct view on sociocultural ideals of beauty and the obsession placed on outward appearances. In Crystal City, Lee creates an eerie cyberspace where Toki and another character, Yong, which means 'dragon' meet and engage in a play of openly erotic stimuli. The characters are highly stylized in their digitally exaggerated reflections therefore creating an illusion between painting and three-dimensional video animation. Crystal City is a fantasyland where dream meets reality and challenges the stereotypical perceptions of women in virtual imagery in the traditionally male-dominated world of game structure.