Left: Rapper Lee Young-ji poses with newly dyed red hair and a red top in an Instagram post uploaded Saturday. Right: In a follow-up post uploaded Monday, she shows her hair dyed back to black and shares an apology for what she described as an "insensitive" post during the election period. (Lee Young-ji's Instagram) A casual hair-color reveal quickly turned into a political controversy for South Korean rapper Lee Young-ji, prompting her to hastily dye her hair black again and issue a public apology.On Saturday, the 23-year-old posted pictures of her newly dyed red hair on Instagram, captioning them "Isn't my hair color pretty?" She paired the post with the song "Redred" by boy group Cortis and later shared more pictures of herself in a red top.Red is typically the color for the conservative bloc, while blue is for liberals. Saturday was the last of two days of early voting for the June 3 local elections in South Korea.As controversy grew online, Lee deleted her posts and posted a picture of her hair dyed black, apologizing for the incident."I am aware that many of you were surprised by the story I uploaded on Saturday, which was poorly timed. Many of you pointed out (why the posts were problematic) through direct messages. I rushed to dye my hair to address the situation, which is why my response came late. I am sorry," Lee wrote on her Instagram on Monday.Lee said she had been aware of the sensitivity of the election period, but admitted she had acted carelessly in posting recent photos."Even though I knew this was a sensitive time, I think my desire to communicate got ahead of me, and I ended up posting recent photos without enough consideration. I won't hide behind ignorance as an excuse. I will reflect and learn from this. I apologize for my careless actions," Lee said in the post.South Korea is to hold local elections and parliamentary by-elections on Wednesday, with 23.5 percent of votes already cast in the two-day early voting period that concluded Saturday.