Butterfly

In preparation for the 1988 Summer Olympics, the Korean government evicted one hundred and sixty families out onto the streets. It demolished their houses in the slums of Seoul's Sanggyedong and had luxury apartments built in its place. Dongwon Kim lived with the evicted families for three years and filmed their fight against the state authorities. The alarming film reveals the averted face of a sporting event abused for ideological purposes. He ushered in a new era of Korean social documentaries, revealing the averted face of South Korea perceived as a land of fabulous wealth, happiness, and economic growth.   "The situation requires us to make films on social issues." Dongwon Kim

Archival footage from 1923 of a walk through Busan and Seoul proudly points out land and ship transport, banks and palaces, everyday life in the streets, and festive moments. Only subtle hints - a Japanese-run national bank, or references to a former Korean monarch - reveal that behind the images of prosperity, economic power, and technological progress, a drama of an annexed country is taking place.

The romance between a woman and a dead man from her dream speaks in hints and a poetic visual shorthand. Windows, walls, doors, and railroad tracks signify the impossibility of blending reality and the subconscious. Only through the medium of film can a bridge be built between the realms of the living and the dead and allow the lovers to meet in a lyrical blend of their images.

Nan Lee originally intended to make a documentary about Korean jazz when he became fascinated by the possibilities of improvisation and decided to make a film about life instead. A story about money, porn, and animated agony, it connects documentary and fiction and, with exaggeration and subversive energy, takes a look into the everyday life of a bored young man.   “The film shows how we subconsciously improvise on our journey through life and move to the rhythm of those around us.” Nan Lee

In the port city of Ulsan, fishermen once worshiped the whale as an exalted deity. Today, the port is occupied by Hyundai's steelworks and shipyards. This captivating essay shows how metal colossi are born in the mechanical bowels of factories. Shafts, beams, and cranes of superhuman size form the graceful curves of the mechanical gods of the industrial age. In his second feature film, based on a video installation, Park recontextualizes industrial production. The levitating iron masses transform into artistic and religious artifacts against a backdrop of Mahler, Tibetan songs, and the sound of whales.   "I compose films rather than edit them - to me, it's like creating a piece of music."   Kelvin Kyung Kun Park

A voyeuristic evocation of a three-day funeral ritual presents death as a poetic and political affair. The phantasmagoric details of a dead body, hair, and human skin intersect erotically with intimacy, mystery, and fascination. Wet Dream is the haptic externalization of inner death in an oppressive society. “The film was shot without a screenplay, I don't maintain continuity of time and space, characters or story in it. The result is internal images created by combining fantasy and film experimentation.” Kim Yun-tae

Workers in Asian textile factories, flight attendants, and call center workers represent generations of mothers and daughters who have experienced the onset of neo-liberalism first-hand since the 1970s. Under the control of giants such as Samsung and Daewoo, they come to know the flip side of the dream of prosperity, which is also reflected in the surrealist René Magritte's Kiss of Lovers. The pair have their heads tangled in cloth, much like the heroines of the film, representing global blindness, and raises the question of whether only the exploited Third World workers are blind, or customers of e-shops and branded stores in the west as well.   “At the beginning of my career, I felt like a researcher, activist, social worker, or educator. Now I feel more like a funeral home employee.” Im Heung-soon

Following the modernization and industrialization of the country and the adoption of the Western model, Japan turned to annexed territory to cover the lack of resources on its own soil. Under the rule of the Japanese Empire, Korea thus became a stockpile of human labor and livestock.

This key work of video art from the pre-Internet era presents the present saturated by sensory stimuli and its global dimension in a visionary way. The breathtaking psychedelic stream flows between avant-garde and the mass media, as well as among cultures. Allen Ginsberg, John Cage or Navajo, Korean and Nigerian artists ride the same wave.   “If we could compile a weekly TV festival made up of music and dance from every county, and distributed it free-of-charge round the world via the proposed common video market, it would have a phenomenal effect on education and entertainment.” Nam June Paik

A dynamic mosaic with monumental orchestra accompaniment shows the South Korea of the 1970s as one of the strongest economies of the region. Images of progress of the civilization and modern lifestyle interspersed with strong cultural and religious tradition make an appeal to the divided nation to unite.

The clip, one of twenty news clips that Kim made for the American Information Service shortly after the end of the Korean War, tells the story of a car. The vehicle speaks in a continuous monologue to the audience as it follows the process of its demise and rebirth. The components move from the junkyard to the car factory, where they are transformed into the metal interior of a new vehicle. We are not just following the story of the car, but that of the entire country as it recovers from the war and builds a new economy, led by businesses like Hyundai, a symbol of prosperity and national pride.“How will humanity make enough for three meals a day out of post-war poverty?”Kim Ki-young

We are all Robinson in our own minds. It looks like a room where behind its walls the human soul wanders and drowns in helplessness. Until he discovers solid ground in the form of daily rituals, in the water spraying from the shower, or in the tea bag at the bottom of the mug. The banal detail, accompanied by the adaptation of Karel Krolow's poems and aliquot songs, is fed by spirituality.   "Cho's single-channel tapes and installations are formalist, almost painterly explorations of subjectivity and the subconscious." Seoungho Cho