The lyrics to Ode to Joy, the triumphant final movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, were adapted from Friedrich Schiller’s 1785 poem celebrating strength in unity and the “brotherhood of man.” Beethoven’s version has inspired leaders of political movements as disparate as Mao and Hitler and the European Union—the latter currently employs the piece as the Anthem of Europe. Paradiso, or Paradise, is the third and final act of Dante’s Divine Comedy, which follows the soul’s ascent to heaven following its time in purgatory. With Ode to Joy, Ho Jae Kim’s first solo exhibition in Los Angeles and his first with Nicodim, the artist juxtaposes the two poems in an attempt to find equilibrium between chaos and utopia, neither of which he believes can be…