Fluid Pot of Koreans in NYC: On "KOREA" at FiveMyles

View of Yooah Park's Music Box series (2013) and North Korean posters (from left to right) by Kim In Chang and Ji Jeong Sik.

“KOREA” at FiveMyles Gallery

558 St. John’s Place

Brooklyn, NYC

June 25 – July 13, 2014

            The exhibition simply titled “KOREA,” curated by Han Heng-Gil, is a rare occasion, if not the first here, that has provided an opportunity for New Yorkers to view contemporary works by North and South Korean artists within the same space. Mr. Han has been around the New York City art scene as a curator at The Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning and, over the years, has developed relationships with Korean artists who have both passed through the cultural hub for brief residencies as well as those who have decided to stick around for a longer term. Han occasionally travels back and forth to NYC and South Korea, but the current exhibition at FiveMyles Gallery in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, is the result of a trip the curator recently made to North Korea. He was fortunate to have been able to bring back several paintings by North Korean artists, whose work are on display with those of South Korean as well as Korean American artists.

            Whenever I see an art exhibit as of late, my focus increasingly turns to the curatorial efforts: the way in which the selected art works are displayed as a whole, their flow as overcoming and complicating what the individual works may offer in isolated or otherwise different contexts. Sometimes a curator makes or breaks art works by their arrangements in a given space. My interest in “KOREA” lies in the clear traces of the curator’s hand. When visitors walk into the gallery, the visual divide between the two sides of the space is clear: the two dimensional works along the left side of the space are monochrome, while the works along the right side burst in a clash of vivid colors. In the middle of the floor between the two divides, bronze busts of the former president of South Korea, Lee Myung Bak, and the likewise former ruler of North Korea, Kim Jong-Il, turn around on the floor—just moving in for, or breaking away from, a kiss.

View of SunTek Chung's Me and You, You and Me, 2011 in foreground, projection of Kelvin Kyung Kun Park's Cheonggyecheon Medley (2011) and N. Korean posters (from left to right) by Kim Young Il, Ha Ju Won, and Kim In Chang.

            The bronze work, titled Me and You, You and Me, 2011, is by SunTek Chung, a born-and-raised American. Its position at the center of the space casts a curious light on the nature of the entire show itself: was this convergence of North and South Korean art work—and a critique of North-South relations—only possible by virtue of its locale in New York City, a third-party? NYC serves as the neutral ground (arguably the DMZ in this context) in which the curator (also a “global” citizen in a sense, though South Korean by nationality) is able to articulate a possible utopia or instigate a dialogue about the relationship between two nations whose separation, Mr. Han seems to suggest, have been imposed—and still exist—artificially.

            The installation of the art works indicates the artificiality of the divide between North and South (similarly applicable to East and West, but that is indeed another discussion à la Edward Said). The monochrome side of the exhibit is particularly interesting especially in context of the recent Korean monochrome “trend” as legitimized by exhibitions in “Western” spaces (Alexander Gray Associates in NYC, for one) and the climbing prices for such representative mid- and late-career artists such as (now Guggenheim veteran) Lee Ufan and Park Seo-bo. In contrast, perhaps the nearly intrusive vividness of bright colors on the right side of the gallery may even appear too cheesy and “pop.”

View of the left side of the gallery, including works by Pang In Soo, Kim Tcha Sup, Choi Gye Keun, Choi Il Dan, and Ri Chang.

“KOREA,” however, does not clearly indicate which of the works are by North, South, or Korean American artists. The majestically tacit North Korean monochrome ink paintings hang next to South Korean ones, whereas the display of colorful North Korean propaganda posters from 2007 are interspersed by the equally (if not more) colorful paintings by New York-based Yooah Park and a projection of Cheonggyecheon Medley (2011) by Kelvin Kyung Kun Park, a UCLA and CalArts graduate, who grew up around the world. Kelvin Park’s film portrays South Korean metal shops during the nation’s time of modern development and Yooah Park’s paintings prod at questions about “couples,” but juxtaposed with the propaganda posters, all of their differences melt into a single visual image.

South Korean artist Lee Kakyoung's Window View, 2012

The inclusion of Lee Kakyoung’s video work acts as a humorous visual summary of the almost deceptive melding of the so-called national and cultural divides within the entire exhibition. The work, titled Window View, 2012, is the sole piece placed at a narrow wall adjacent to the monochrome side, only visible when one turns one’s body fully toward the left-hand side. The sneakiest is the work itself: what appears from a distance as a slightly open window penciled onto the surface is actually accompanied by a video projected only onto the open crack of the drawn window. Small people move around busily outside (inside?) this fictional opening.

The best thing about the exhibition, though, is that the visual result achieved by the curatorial efforts overcomes what could have been a cheesy, ideologically propaganda-esque, and utopia-driven project about a “united” Korea. The simultaneous dissonances and resonances offered by the visual selection of works in “KOREA” reaches beyond a singular argument for a possible utopia, but rather opens a dialogue. During my visit, I overheard other visitors argue whether or not the Kelvin Park’s film projection was a North Korean film. We need fresh eyes to look at our world anew in order to change it for the better. I received some hope today that it may still be possible with art.