Group Exhibition - INTERVIEW : 525,600 Hours of Baengnyeong-do - / 2013,2014 /

Incheon Art Platform, Baengnyeong-do,  South Korea

This work was done on the Korean island called Baengnyeong Island. The island is located right on the military border between South and North Korea. (It is 193 km from South Korea and 17 km from North Korea. It is South Korean territory, but the distance shows that it is very close to North Korea). I stayed here for three months in 2013 and 2014 to make this piece. During my stay, I saw barbed wire fences everywhere on this beautiful island. At the same time, I often saw red roses, which the island's grandmothers carefully grow in their gardens.
I thought I would like to change the 100 km of barbed wire fence at the military base near my residence with red rose ivy. Every morning I would pack red artificial roses in my suitcase and carry a stepladder and go to the barbed wire. I then put a few roses on the barbed wire every day. I continued this process from morning until evening. I felt it was meaningful for me to do this work alone.
As I worked every day, more and more islanders said hello to me. And they would say, "Good work." or "Are you eating well?" and more and more people gave me drinks and food. One day, an old man said to me, "Thank you for making it beautiful." I thought it was a good thing that I made this work.
The barbed wire and rose ivy were inspired by the picture on the poster of the Pan-European Picnic of 1989. When I was a student, I learned about the events in Hungary that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall. At the time, The word "picnic" attracted me, from which I imagined that people lightly jumped over the heavy walls called "nation". I worked hoping that Baengnyeong Island would one day also become a place symbolising peace.
However, I did not think the concept or background of the work was very important. I wanted to make the barbed wire fence something completely different and beautiful rather than that.
During this period, I also held workshops with children to make roses, and to draw places they would like to visit in the future on a picnic sheet and then go on a picnic together.