Design Bridge U.K. will hold its first exhibition of British and Korean artists in Seoul starting next week.
The exhibition features nine artists who are either from the U.K. or have studied and lived there and looks at the theme of cultural displacement.
“Through art works by Korean artists who used to stay in the U.K. and British artists who are currently staying in Korea, DBUK makes a network between Korean and British artists as well as builds a creative cultural foundation by sharing unique artistic experiences in two different cultures,” said Han Sang-hun, a designer and the director of DBUK.
Photographer Simon Bond captures people in traditional dress in modern surroundings. In “Lost” an elderly lady looks out of place surrounded by people absorbed in their mobile phones, but Bond questions whether the others are more lost in themselves than she is.
“Lost” by Simon Bond
In another he captures three women gathered on a street in purple hanbok, explaining that it shows a kind of sisterhood commonly seen in Korea.
Sarah McCauley looks at the human body and conceptions of beauty. In her installation “A Ritualized Journey,” she uses scaled-up drawings of orifices repeated across the walls and objects in a room. She explains that the suggestions of the image are expected to initially disgust on some level, but eventually win the viewer over with their own beauty.
“A Ritualized Journey” by Sarah McCauley
Lee Yeon-suk’s “Re-Use Me-Memoir12,” a sculpture from plastic bags, questions how objects gain their value even when they have no obvious use.
DBUK, which has already run several workshops and seminars, was set up by Han to support emerging designers and artists.
“I met young artists and designers who couldn’t find their pathway and worried a lot,” he said. “I want to help them ... so I started the DBUK project.”
DBUK is in the process of organizing a second exhibition and has secured funding for a community project on Daecheongdo Island, west of Incheon.
The project will involve weaving plastic bags into carpets as well as weaving together the stories of seniors on the island into a fictionalized mythology. Artist Park Hye-min will make an object that signifies the heritage based on this mythology. A third part of the project will involve schoolchildren on the island.
DBUK also has a blog, on which there are regular columns by local writers related to art and design, and can be found at http://blog.naver.com/dbuker, although most of the content is in Korean.
“Things that Could Have Been” by Byeon Woo-jae
The exhibition will be held at the Orange Pencil B1 Gallery in Gwanak-gu, Seoul, from July 1-14. Opening hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
By Paul Kerry (paulkerry@heraldcorp.com)
