hankyoreh

the president of Korea National University of Art shakes hands with a KNUA employee just after announcing his resignation in the university’s auditorium located in the Seokkwan neighborhood of Seoul

Sparks from the firestorm over the current presidential administration‘s “removal” of progressively oriented culture organization heads have spread over to the Korea National University of Arts (KNUA), a state-run art education institution. KNUA, which opened in 1992 with the mission of developing professionals in the arts, is now faced with its biggest crisis yet with the resignation of its president, Hwang Ji-woo, in protest of an intensive audit by the school’s supervising organization, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST).

Conservatives in the culture sector have been escalating their criticism against interdisciplinary program reorganization efforts recently pursued by Hwang and progressive-leaning professors, referring to the efforts as facilitating “the creation of a leftist training grounds.” The MCST subsequently cut off budgetary support and launched a targeted audit in order to put the brakes on the efforts. The school‘s identity and the foundation for its existence are now left reeling.

Observers are saying that the main focus of this audit was to reorganize the university in the name of “institutional improvements,” and it is not rooted in any personal matters involving Hwang. The audit records list 12 items cited for improvement or reprimand. A good number of them appear to present grounds for countercharges of infringement on KNUA’s institutional autonomy. According to Hwang, the list includes things like reducing and/or abolishing theory departments like the Creation of Narratives department and The Center for Consilience of Ubiquitous Arts and Technology, an art and technology study initiative.

The most controversial area involved the expansion of the interschool education and theory divisions pursued since March 2008 by a “future education preparation group” headed by Hwang and Shim Kwang-hyun, a professor in the School of Film, TV and Multimedia. The goal was to develop well-rounded artists through providing an interdisciplinary education, in which a variety of artistic genres, humanities and new media technologies would be engaged in relation with one another.

Culture Minister Yu In-chon ordered a halt to the initiative last year, saying that it went against the school’s mission of cultivating art professionals with practical abilities. This year, the MCST cut the entire interschool education programs’ budget, and the school has been operating related programs by drawing expenses from action committee fees. Conservative internet media and cultural conservatives like Byun Hee-jae and Jeong Jin-su have been focusing their attacks on The Center for Consilience of Ubiquitous Arts and Technology, which received a budget of more than 3 billion won last year, calling it an excuse to create seats for leftist forces. This also appears to be the pretext of various allegations made by “Media Watch Weekly” and other conservative media last March about the Center‘s insolvency, and charges about preferential lecture fees for Jin Jung-kwon, also a professor at Chung-Ang University and a progressive commentator.

The consensus is that Hwang’s act of resigning instead of facing disciplinary measures reflects his frustration with the continued pursuit of the Center after Minister Yu called for a halt to it last year. In his resignation statement, Hwang stated, “This investigation was not intended to bring about my retirement, but to tear apart and reconstruct the school.” He also stated, “The vandalism caused by bureaucrats tinkering with emerging art educational programs is terrible.”

The MCST, conservative groups and conservative Internet media have been marching in lockstep together trying to reconstruct KNUA for several months. Forum for the Future of Culture, a conservative culture organization　headed by Sungkyunkwan University professor Jeong Jin-Soo urged the government at a symposium held in September 2008 to make organization reductions and structural reforms at KNUA, charging that KNUA had gotten away from its founding goal of developing art professionals. Conservative Internet media like “Dongnip Sinmun” began focusing allegations against the Center in March and their comments were echoed in the audits findings.

KNUA held an emergency institute directors‘ meeting Tuesday where they agreed to establish a response team to begin the process of lodging a formal objection to the audit’s findings and recommendations. Meanwhile, KNUA‘s Faculty Council has already issued a statement about their objections and will convene a meeting on Friday. The Faculty Council counters that the audit was an infringement of their rights as educators. Students have also been mobilizing a response, focusing their energy on defending the interdisciplinary and theory majors. In response, the conservative Forum for the Future of Culture plans to call for a plan for restructuring KNUA at a May 27 symposium on cultural policy amendments. Observers expect this will only heat things up further.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]