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Is the genre division between art and film still valid? Nowadays, audiences enjoy any interesting video work, whether it be in a museum or a theatre. They are not bound by the classification used by professional video artists or filmmakers, nor by the spatial characteristics of white cubes or black boxes. “FILM_Text and Image," an MMCA film and video program that is presented at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art’s Seoul venue, recently introduced the cinematic works of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Susan Sontag, etc. The 9th annual exhibition of the Buk-Seoul Museum of Art (SeMA), “Title Match” invited Im Heung-soon and Omer Fast, both of whom are working as video artists and film directors. 2022 Jeonju International Film Festival also featured a special section “Borderless Storyteller”, showcasing works by eight artists including Kim Heecheon and Moojin Brothers, which was published as a book by the same title.

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The ARTRO is featuring the “Video Works Occupy Exhibition Spaces” series of articles. This series features a written piece titled “Reading between the Mirror and the Screen”, by Kim Mijung, who curated “Media Punk: Belief, Hope & Love” in 2019 at the ARKO Art Center, followed by introductions of four artists (or collectives): Kim Woong Yong, Ryu Hansol, Park Sunho and 업체eobchae. We hope this feature article will serve as an opportunity to reflect upon the video images that cross these genres and spaces today.

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Ryu Hansol was greatly influenced by the form, content, and tradition of gore films and cartoon genres, and explores various mediums of video, drawing, installation, and performance. In the video work, the artist applies vulgar and exaggerated special effects to everyday objects in order to ‘damage’ her body, transforming the absurdity inherent in our society and gender norms into grotesque humor. Ryu studied Western painting at Sungkyunkwan University and has presented solo exhibitions including “THE PICTURE SHOW” (2021, Mihakgwan) and “Chrichri Merrychri Stmas” (2019, Sungkyun Gallery). Ryu participated in many group shows, “sticky” (2022, mu.mokjeok), “The Raw” (2022, Incheon Art Platform), 11th Seoul Mediacity Biennale “One Escape at a Time” (2021, Seoul Museum of Art), “PACK: Adventure! Double Cross” (2019, Post Territory Ujeongguk), “The 4th Art Factory Project” (2014, Culture Station Seoul 284) and many more.
https://www.youtube.com/@bbagikbbagik346

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Virgin Road, 2021, HD video, color, sound, 10min 21sec.

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Can you introduce yourself please? We would like to hear more on the subjects that you are interested in.
I am interested in the tactile imagination associated with body transformation, and based on this, I have been working on visualizing the contradictory senses of fear and humor captured in everyday life. My work mostly borrows from B-gore genres and cartoonish language. I am very interested in the discord found in the gap between contradictory things, which mainly occurs when the grotesque and a sense of humor come together. I think about elements that cause conflicting emotions or sensations and reassemble them to create a video.

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Is there any reason why you chose video images as a means for some of your works, amongst various media?
First of all, I feel that the camera today is recognized as a part of the body. Perhaps because of this, it is interesting that this medium makes it easy to connect with the people in the video when watching someone else's video. The point where the context is reversed, depending on the camera's point of view, is also interesting.
The second reason is that I thought it was the most efficient medium for realizing the short narrative I had imagined, because that narrative can occur immediately over time. However, at the same time, it is also possible to hinder the process of reconstructing the inherent elements of video and incorporating them into a narrative.
In other words, the video image is a field where one can experiment with one's own sense of distance between the inside and outside of the video. I chose it because I thought it is the most suitable medium for experimenting with ‘what it means to be real’ and ‘what reality is’. This is possible in this medium by recombining the conditions, such as linear narrative, poor special effects, exaggerated acting, and unmatched sound.

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Pong Pong, 2014, HD video, color, sound, 6min 7sec.

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Most of your work is based on tactile body images. What sparked your interest in tactile sensation and body image?
This originated with the question: ‘what is the most living thing?’ Through fake documentary footage I happened to see in the past, I realized that images of the human body appearing in B-gore genre and images of the human body seen at the scene of an accident can be scary, funny, or remorseful, depending on whether they are real or not. This was a shocking experience. In this gap between reality and fiction, I began to think about a situation in which fear becomes laughter and laughter becomes fear, depending on the distance. I began to work using this idea.
In regards to the tactile sense, I think the sense of touch is lacking the most, especially nowadays when hyper-real visual objects are so overflowing. And at the same time, I feel that the tactile sense is the element that makes an image seem the most alive thing. These are the reasons why I am focused on the tactile sense.

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We happened to consider that three-dimensionality or site-specificity is important in the tactile sense. In such context, I would like to ask you your concerns in choosing the video medium, rather than installation or sculpture. Can you explain about your overall process of the work?
If visual images and sound are put together, they can provide a more exaggerated and amplified sense than they actually are, such as in ASMR videos. In fact, some things can seem to be more realistic when seen in a video. And to me, the tactile sensation felt in these exaggerating visual objects is more interesting than the tactile sensation that arises from seeing the material with my own eyes. I think this is a different story than the tactile sense of sculpture. What I think about the most here is the tactile sense of the object in the context of a video narrative.
To explain the overall working process, I first think of onomatopoeic and mimetic words related to the body, and connect them with events, scenes, and experiences I have encountered in my daily life. Then I develop my ideas by identifying objects and body parts, making props for the video, and creating my own storyboard drawings. Filming does not follow the normal pursuit of efficient video production, but rather is done in the order of focusing on a person's experiences as if they were a performance. After that, the video is completed in the editing process. If there is a blockage in the video production process, I tend to try to unravel the problem by drawing out onomatopoeia/mimetic words, objects, or specific cuts in the storyboard.

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Chrichri Merrychri Stmas, 2018, HD video, color, sound, 26min 52sec.

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You have been working on the body image, especially the way and scene which the body is ‘damaged’. In particular, can you elaborate on why you focus on the process of damaging the body rather than the damaged body?
The act of mutilating the body in my video does not symbolize violence in the sadistic sense of inflicting pain. Rather, it is a metaphor of liberation from the rules and power that regulate and oppress the socially sound shape of the body. In the process of this liberation, a kind of 'pleasure' occurs, and elements like ASMR accompany this immediate 'pleasure'. The more abhorrent, the more audible the tactile sound, the more involved in the process of mutilation, the more that this pleasure of liberation is amplified. For example, in a splatter movie, the ‘pleasure’ of a messy scene where blood gushes like a fountain does not stem from the damaged body itself, but rather from maximizing the sense of liberation in an ingenious way. So, when filming a video, it is important not to follow the order of normal efficiency, but rather to carry out the process in an order as if staging a performance.

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Meanwhile, some devices showing that the scene of body mutilation is fictional appear throughout the work. The examples include exaggerated acting and crude props that resemble the body. These devices prevent viewers from fully immersing themselves into the video and sometimes create a humorous atmosphere, so I wonder why you’d prefer this way of directing.
One of the basic premises of laughter is the distance between the subject and the viewer. I wanted to interrupt the immersion of the viewer from the narrative in the cruel scenes. I hoped that the appearance of flimsy props and special effects would serve as an opportunity to think about the existence and identity of the object, focusing on the materiality of the object rather than the role imposed on it, and repetitive acts of violence being volatilized. When the body is split in half and the vertebrae are exposed, it is not done using a prop that tries to reproduce the vertebrae as much as possible outwardly, but rather a disposable cable tie tied indifferently and powerlessly, in order to distance itself from reality. I wanted to reveal both the representation and the system of representation, and through this process I wanted to present the tangible and visible reality of cable ties and jelly that deviated from the narrative. So, I hoped that the viewers could maintain their distance from the subject through laughter, while gazing at the subject materially and thinking about the reality of today.

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According to one previous interview, you explained that you borrow the way that video images are consumed today. You reflect these, including memes, tutorial video grammar, and self-development videos, in your work process. What are the particular kinds of video images that you are paying attention to, especially among the overflowing video images of today?
To me, the videos I encounter through social media and YouTube are regarded as objects of desire, which derived from parts lacking in reality. My recent work Virgin Road (2021) was produced by reflecting upon the grammar of self-improvement videos. There seemed to be a strange intersection between the pressure to marry and to lead a successful life within the emotional clichés, motivational and self-development videos on YouTube. This operated in the sense that you seem to want something desperately, but once you realize it, you become more distant and separated from it. Let’s say, you want something, you despise it, you are comforted by it, but in the end, it is nothing more than self-consolation as it volatilizes so quickly. I spot these schizophrenic parts that are both really wonderful and superficial at the same time, especially the points that seem to bounce off each other in fragments.

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Virgin Road, 2021, HD video, color, sound, 10min 21sec.

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Exhibition View of Virgin Road at The 11th Seoul Mediacity Biennale “One Escape at a Time” (2021). (Photo by Chulki Hong, Glimworkers)

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In the past, video works have been ‘screened’ in so-called black box spaces represented by movie theaters or cathode-ray tubes. Now as various video works are displayed in the ‘white cube’, i.e., the gallery space, the boundaries between genres are blurring. Furthermore, the spread of mobile devices and the advent of the Internet era allow video images to be viewed anywhere and everywhere. I would like to hear about what you consider or contemplate the most when presenting video work in white cube spaces.
YouTube channels are played on different mobile phones and monitor specifications, so you can watch them more from a content perspective, and more easily see them within the viewer's environment. On the other hand, in a museum I can choose the conditions I want, and I always consider the context of the overall planning of the exhibition, the context of the movement in the exhibition space, and the context of viewing it within the installation.

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Do you think there is ‘a form of speech only pertinent to video’, to quote Curator Kim Mijung? We would like to hear your thoughts on this.
Yes, I agree. I think the elements of which a video consists, such as narrative, camera perspective, props, sound, acting, background music, etc., fall under that idea.

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Is there any video artist (artist or team who works based on video images) in Korea whom you have particularly noticed recently? We would like to hear your recommendation.
I would recommend the video works by artist Lee Sanghee, who recently exhibited at The Reference. This was a research project oriented around images of whales. In addition to the contents, it was interesting to see the artist’s attempt to use the screen of video as a kind of window looking out at whale images. This seemed to speculate about the screen as both a frame and a window. And it was nice to feel like I was inside of a whale’s stomach.

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