Friday, February 1, 2008

Exhibtion as a art director in South Korea







Heterotophia – AFDS (Acquired Freedom Deficiency Syndrome) Vaccination Room


Written by Petra oh

Sketch of the Exhibition Scene
The exhibition held in the afternoon of January 12 turned out a great success with approximately 250 artists and related persons in attendance, despite the harsh weather. It began with a seminar at one o’clock in the afternoon, followed by an introductory speech by the sponsor of the ‘Art World’, and proceeded in order of announcement of the New-Frontier judgment results, Rising Artist Convention, Rising Artist Award Ceremony, and a performance celebrating the exhibition.

Seminar and the Success of the Performance
For this event, art historian Hae-Sook Chun was invited to hold a seminar celebrating the exhibition. In the seminar held at one o’clock in the afternoon, at Seoul’s 600-year memorial hall, Hae-Sook Chun critiqued and conversed with rising artists. She candidly spoke about the problems of the current art world and anticipated future path, also pointing out the needs to face the reality and to create individualistic language much like strong teeth that will digest anything.
Through this lecture, Hae-Sook Chun gave a coherent explanation of the idea of Heterotophia, of granting eligibility through new free space, and furthermore emphasized the necessity of knowing art history in order to correctly understand modern art. Moreover, she insisted that the interest of the rising artists in the theory of post-modernism based on the post-structural principle needs to be linked with their own to establish a foundation. It was an opportunity to think over our reality that needs continuous consideration together, rather than reconsidering the meaning of globalization or excessively rallying the slogan with political support, in a period where flowing trends tend to have no individuality and where space and time are unified.

At the same time, a performance titled ‘Freedom! Toward that Minute Vibration’, which harmonized well with pre-installed art pieces, grabbed the audience’s attention by portraying interestingly the process of discovering the meaning of freedom and space, which were the theme of the exhibition. Performers included six members of KoPAS (Korean Performing Arts Spirit) Baek-Ki Kim, Hwan Ryu, Choon-Ki Kim, Tiger Pak, Young-Ho Cho, Dae-Won Kim. There was an analysis by the performing group, that true freedom, which was also the theme of the exhibition, could be confirmed through the mutual understanding with the audience, not the fixed idea. This performance received favorable criticism as it harmonized individual performers’ characteristic traits and originality, and portrayed the concept of freedom and space with depth in composition; it was not performed merely for festivals or amusement purposes.

New Age of Reviving Arts Culture, Year 2001, and 201 Rising Artists to Start With!
There are various slogans stressing the importance of finding new faces and new art in the world of art. Many artists are under the obsession of the new and try to self-transform. Rising Artist Convention was established in order to give a chance for the young dedicated artists to discharge the energy and to have them excavated as well as sponsored. Denial of and challenge toward the established values are the key attitude that the rising artists must have, and the intent of the Rising Artists Conventions was to listen to them. Also, making the best of the nature of a technical journal of arts, it drew up a theme exhibition, visualizing, and therefore insuring substantiality.

Exhibition’s theme ‘Heterotophia-AFDS (Postnatal Freedom Deficiency Syndrome) Vaccination Room’ was focused on freedom and space, to examine how rising artists accept the dichotomous structure of the existing dominant culture like the 20th century’s purity and adaptation, high-quality and low-quality, genres and genres, and antiquated prejudices, such as falsified utilization of personal relationship. This exhibition also intends to manifest cultural analysis and views on our society through the abilities that only rising artists have, by expressing the theme in various genres, breaking from the convention of what usually ends like an informal social gathering.

New World Year 2001, Excavation of 201 Rising Artists.
The Rising Artists Convention, which was promoted by our head office and sponsored by the Ministry of Culture & Tourism and the Korean Fine Arts Association (1.6-1-12 Seoul Museum of Art), came upon its seventh this year, and was a nation-wide theme project for the celebration of the seventeenth anniversary of our paper’s first publication. Rising Artists Convention started out aiming to measure the current state of Korean modern art, while promoting the activation of local art by casting off rising artists nationwide, and to overcome the current art culture centralized in Seoul.
Works of 201 young artists were exhibited, by being recommended by commissioners; this method was introduced in the fifth convention. Primary selection was made among art university professors, in Seoul and other local places, who have produced a great number of artists. Secondary selection was made among many active professional artists, curators, and press corps.

How is Korean Arts’ New Sensibility in the New Generation?
In this Rising Artists Convention, young artists displayed works of various levels, ranging from an unrefined state to a well-polished state that astonished the older generation, and among them mostly three dimensional pieces received generous criticism. On the other hand, despite the fact that they are the new generation, some had old modeling senses in analyzing freedom and space, while others had sparkling ideas to stand out from the others, at the convention arranged to see the trend of the younger Korean artists through their voice.

In order to be in this exhibition, artists were to register along with a detailed plan an explanation of the concept of the art piece; when recommended by a reporter, it was fully based on the portfolio.
In the case of media, the committee of Rising Artist Convention paid a visit to the workshop to listen to the explanation of the artwork. However, despite the fact that presentation of portfolio is the essential part of publicizing art pieces, artists were generally not familiar with making them. Some artists were recommended, but exhibited pieces far from the theme of the exhibition and some even were not able to participate due to lack of preparation of their pieces.
Overall, plans of art pieces included candid presentations of the artist’s work, but were too personal and lacked writing skills, that the actual piece seemed too distant from the explanation; it was said later that there were only few written plans that actually helped understand the pieces.

To be more specific, artists, in their ways of expressing, surprised persons related to art when utilizing technological medium such as digital and the media with their outstanding skill. However, unfortunately, they lacked independent will in the language of style and trend, merely adopting the international trend and elaborating only externally, showing limitations of individuality.

One of the observers of this exhibition pointed out that the young artists seriously need ‘prospective thinking’ in order to refrain from losing their own language when over reacting to the trend. On the whole, artists in this exhibition received generous criticism that their passion, energy, and the depth of concepts were much more mature than before.

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