Korean language

Current Position: Seoul 2017

PUBLISHING

“Current Position: Seoul 2017” is a compilation of ideas related to promoting the imagination of “after,” placing oneself in various contexts of real-world society, and creating a voluntary platform for art major students and art professionals.

The lecture program “Current Position,” continued after the fall of 2016, introduced projects focusing on “placeness.” In particular, “Current Position: Seoul 2017” tried to compose Seoul through cultural and artistic activities and the prism of women. In the first lecture, Dong-geun Lim, a geographer, shared his insight on the development of Seoul through demographic changes and talked about the issues pertaining to women in metropolitan cities. After that, CasCo Curator Binna Choi, who organizes activities centered on critical art practice, going back and forth between Seoul and Utrecht, and Dirk Fleischmann, a planner of RAT and a writer, an art school that operates a platform for self-directed learning under the catchphrase “Seoul as a city of art,” Soryeong Park, CEO of Publy, who produces and distributes intellectual content based on an online platform, and Professor Hyunseok Seo, who works on documentaries and performances based on research on Asian cities, gave lectures respectively.

Dong-geun Lim (geog.snu.ac.kr)This lecture analyzed the modern history of Seoul under the theme of metropolis and women, aiming to examine the development of Seoul through demographic changes and to examine the issues pertaining to women in large cities. For example, the concentration of young men who migrated to Seoul alone did not last long. While manufacturing development centered on heavy industry complexes was common in provinces, Seoul was populated with well-educated, professional manpower (male) and low-educated, service industry (female), and light industry (female). As in the representative Guro Industrial Complex, the economic structure of Seoul changed significantly after economic growth centered on the female labor force, followed by significant spatial changes, such as the change of residence by class, the emergence of wealthy villages, and the demolition of slums. On the other hand, the expansion of the commercial service industry called gentrification today can be explained in terms of the female workforce in large cities. The lecture focused on the lecturer’s two studies, “Age-specific concentration patterns in South Korea” and “Female concentration in Metropolitan Area.”

Binna Choi (casco.art)Seoul contains almost no small and medium-sized art institutions. There is an urgent need for a third space between very small and large institutions that can surpass either the lonely and precarious “self-reliance” or abnormal and authoritative operation. We will talk about Casco in the Netherlands as a potential example of this third space. Looking at the examples of “artistic research” projects that traverse and recruit interdisciplinary and disparate communities, we explored the potential of an institution that can be differentiated from the past concepts of “solidarity” or career “network” by dealing with some keywords, such as intimacy, triadic problems, weak connections, and ecosystems, that create another layer of linkage and internal action.

Soryeong Park (publy.co)In connection with the employment support policy, the government is operating programs to support young people in the field of culture and arts to establish start-ups and create a job. Meanwhile, those involved in art management are trying to systematize the foundation of the activities of cultural and artistic producers, and furthermore, they are making efforts to expand the industry into the bigger culture and art content industry. This lecture provided an opportunity to hear about the background, establishing process, current status, and future plans of Publy, which advocates an “online platform of intellectual content.” Also, it was an opportunity to explore what the online environment could be like as a platform for cultural and artistic works and practices. The lecture was conducted by answering specific questions from the participants.

Sungtae Park (junglim.org) & Doojin Hwang (djharch.com)We listened to the initiatives of “Architecture School,” which has been hosted by the Junglim Foundation for the past 5 years and its self-evaluation of the progress and accumulated results. “Architecture School” is a project carried out based on interest in the reasons and purpose of learning architecture and ways to participate in “architecture work” even if participants are not architects. Among the detailed programs of the “Architecture School,” this lecture focused on “Architecture and City Expressed through the Body,” with individual lectures and a conversation between planner Sungtae Park and architect Doojin Hwang. We also learned about the achievements of the Junglim Foundation as a platform for architecture-centered cultural and art projects and its future plans.

Dirk Fleischmann (ratschoolofart.com)To show an example of an independent community centered on art education outside of institutional education, we invited the organizer of the RAT school of ART. It was an opportunity to hear about its overview, initiatives, current status, and self-assessment of RAT at this stage. We listened to the helpful stories for art students and artists when planning independent collective works. In addition, we wanted to hear the thoughts of the planners on “Seoul as a city of art,” which is also stated in the RAT mission.

Hyunsuk Seo (communication.yonsei.ac.kr)The lecture introduced the projects of Professor Hyunsuk Seo, who produces documentaries and performances focusing on Asian metropolitan cities and buildings. We also reviewed research and writing activities in connection with creation and production projects such as “Future Art,” a collection of writings on performing arts, and “Ob-Scene,” which stands for a multidisciplinary art magazine. We were able to look at the cross-sections of the complex situation of university-based research and education activities, projects promoted in cooperation with domestic and foreign art institutions, and activities that are tied to the rhetoric of “pluralistic.”

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