Biennale Arte 2017. Korean Pavilion. This newspaper is published by the Korean Pavilion. Printed in 10,000 copies. korean-pavilion.or.kr THE COUNTERBALANCE 10 USD = 10 EUR = 100 HRK = 10 GBP = 10 CHF = 100 ARS = 100 DKK = 100 PLN = 100 ZAR = 10,000 COP ARTIST INTERVIEW VENETIAN RHAPSODY 12 TEXTS MIKE KELLEY DAVID PAGEL JEREMY GILBERT-ROLFE SAUL OSTRAW JERRY SALTZ JEFFREY DEITCH PETER HALLEY REENA JANA SARA DIAMOND DAVID RIMANELLI SUMI KANG LAURENCE A. RICKELS CODY CHOI THE COUNTERBALANCE VENETIAN RHAPSODY Interview with Cody Choi “An international art event such as the Venice Biennale has both causal and symptomatic relations to the imperialism of this order. My work in the 2017 Korean Pavilion suggests that casino capitalism signals the death of art, but also presages a new kind of hope for its resurrection, in the era of speculation and excess.” Cody Choi CODY CHOI The first thing that captivates the audience at the destruction of the Korean War, Korea experienced a profound issue of labor and means of production simply by connecting Korean Pavilion is your dazzling forest of neon signage historical trauma, which manifested itself as a cultural crisis. them through a causal relationship, then the economist J.B. that sits atop the building. It reminds us of Las Vegas’ Throughout the turbulent period following the war, the US Say’s law of markets must be addressed as well. We all know streets, lined up with casinos, but, at the same time, was perceived as a military savior and became a cultural that the issue of the alienation of labor emerged in Asia it creates an interesting contrast with the greenery role model, providing a paradigm for the accumulation of during the formation of a global market after World War II. surrounding the Korean Pavilion. Could you tell us wealth and the display of its signs. The culture of the US As the market became global, Hong Kong was established about this piece? Army, in particular, had a striking and direct influence on as the trading hub to regularize Asia’s cheap labor as a Korea’s impoverished youth of the 1950s and 60s. American means of production. This trend also finally reached Korea Venetian Rhapsody is the result of a rigorous reconsideration culture conjured endless possibilities and generated awe as in the 1970s in the form of the Five-Year Plans for industrial that commenced when I was invited to show my work at the well as confusion. Koreans falsely assumed, for instance, that development, launched by the former president and dictator Korean Pavilion of the 57th Venice Biennale. In the past, I had Americanization—a process of emulation driven by envy and of Korea, Park Chung-hee. I remember these programs being been somewhat skeptical, and even bitter, about events like misunderstandings—was the equivalent of Westernization and taught and promoted, when I was in middle school. “Korea-US the Biennale. The invitation therefore produced a powerful modernization. For years, Americanization fostered dreams cooperation” was the phrase often used with confidence by inner conflict that I was obligated to confront. Working and delusions about the sophistication of Western modernity many industries then. But in fact, the US was building plants through it, I had the opportunity to reflect on the geo-cultural and its cultures. in Korea and supplied the orders, while Korea only functioned implications of the city of Venice. Venice has been a tourist city similarly to an OEM by providing cheap labor. I think the whose economy fuses art and commercialism. It is also a city “Mr. K” represents the chaos that marked Korea’s issue of wage-labor imbalance in Korea that took shape then that has inspired grandiose dreams for many artists. It seems modern and contemporary history, and moments from is continuing to this day. To address the seriousness of this to me those who take part in the Venice Biennale are lured Mr. K’s life set the context for the Korean Pavilion’s problem in the 1970s, some students participated in workers’ and swayed by the city’s glittering image. Perhaps, I am not an exhibition. That makes us curious about your life before rights activist movements. Among them was Jeon Tae-il, who exception. you became an artist. committed suicide by burning himself to death in a protest against poor working conditions in Korea. An interesting I think it is only natural that artists struggle between the I was born in 1961 in Hyehwa-dong, a neighborhood in point to note is that Korea’s bonded goods industry had its pressure they experience as artists representing the nation Seoul. My parents were born in 1920 during the Japanese beginnings then, when people started to siphon defective and the freedom granted to them by the very nature of colonial rule, got married and saw the country’s liberation goods from the factories, instead of discarding them. "Nice" art. The Venice Biennale’s participating artists are often together. After their first daughter (my oldest sister) was born, products (knockoff Nikes) were sold in Itaewon, Ichon-dong understood as having proposed a new artistic model and the Korean War broke out. They had two more daughters and shops by Ewha Women’s University. A growing number are thereby seen as representative of their era. An artist can during the war. My parents, however, lost two daughters. of women wanted to buy American bonded merchandise. be said to have accomplished a grand goal as an artist, if Oddly enough, I was born after my eldest sister died, and I They were probably the earlier versions of today’s petites he or she is invited to the Biennale as a participating artist. happen to have the same birthday as her. When I was born in bourgeoises, obsessing over luxury goods. This facet of Asia’s Such notions have been formed by the reputation the Venice 1961, the Eighth United States Army (EUSA) was dominating industrialization is often called the “simulacrum industry” in Biennale holds in the art world. Artists who recognize this Korea. I recently learned of a person called “The Father of the world, and recently, Korea has been gaining a ‘reputation’ are bound to place themselves under much pressure. They Korean Modernization” in a recent web search. I searched on as the country that manufactures the ‘best quality’ counterfeit often fall for the trap that they must lead art’s progress or Wikipedia and found out that this person is General James goods. make social contributions through art. The Venice Biennale, Van Fleet, who served as the second Commander of the EUSA. in short, is an event where art, capital and tourism converge. One of the most striking memories I have from childhood To me, the 1980s in Korea is remembered as the era when This fusion created a mechanism unique to the Biennale, and is seeing women and children queue for food and other protests for democracy and feelings of love and hatred toward the city of Venice demonstrates the limits and confusions of supplies in front of the EUSA building. I think these women the United States coexisted in the nation. In the 1990s, Korea contemporary art through the irony produced by geopolitical were probably the so-called mije ajumma, who sold these opened its doors to foreign cultures, and Western culture dynamics. Paradoxically, my works exhibited at the Korean EUSA goods on the black market. At the time, people who was quickly adopted by those who studied abroad or the Pavilion this year reflect the criticism I offer on this topic as were able to afford American goods on the black market were generation that dreamed of the American paradise. It was also an artist. The first Biennale was held in 1895, but Venice had considered economically and culturally ‘advanced.’ Another during the 90s that America’s neoliberalist economic policies been an actively trading merchant city even before then. This memory that I have from my childhood is going out to the quickly gained momentum in Korea, after the country was gave way to the emergence of the Venetian school, which streets, instead of going to school, to wave the Korean flag hit hard by the Asian financial crisis. Neoliberalist economics included Bellini, Titian and Tintoretto. For centuries, Venice and cheer on the Tiger Division and the White Horse Division, already had a long history in the United States. Beginning with has maintained its economy as a tourist city through its fusion deploying to Vietnam. In the 1970s, I was a feisty teenager, full Milton Friedman’s new monetarism, the Chicago school of of commerce and its picturesque landscape. Venice has of vigor. I became curious about women, after flipping through economics developed Keynesian economics and argued for also inspired lofty dreams for many artists, art patrons, and the Playboy, Penthouse and Club magazines, supplied by neoliberalist economics, and this movement reached its peak collectors—from the souvenir painters of the Grand Tour to the US. army. My fantasies about the West grew as I watched in the 1980s, along with the Reagan administration in the US the romantic reverence of Turner and Ruskin and 20th century the American TV series Bonanza, Combat, The Green Hornet, and Thatcherism in Great Britain. Susan Strange noted later, postmodern artist. It seems to me that other key actors in the The Wild Wild West, and I mimicked the superficiality of the in the 1990s, that the problems of neoliberalist economics art world are just as lured by the city’s splendor. The Venice petite bourgeoisie by listening to pop songs on pirate label and the global era were predicated on what she terms “casino Biennale, which has been swaying people with its ‘cultural LP records.