hankyoreh

“So they are redeveloping the neighborhood right next to Cheong Wa Dae? Is that the president’s decision? How big is the area?”

“What, they’re doing this without even telling the people that live here?”

These are the sorts of whispers heard around the area of 30, Tongui-dong, opposite the western side of Cheong Wa Dae (the presidential office in South Korea or Blue House) and the Gyeongbokgung Palace in Seoul. It began on May 7, after a real estate agent’s office in a shipping container appeared on the corner of two alleyways and put up a bird’s eye view drawing of a plan to redevelop the entire area by putting up blocks of massive apartments in front of the Blue House.

Lying up against the side of a nearby building site, the office features a neon sign saying “Royal Blue Real Estate.” Unusually, its facade is made entirely of glass. A look inside reveals a drawing of state-of-the-art, 18-story apartment blocks filling the Tongui neighborhood area that are outrageously to be erected directly in front of the Cheong Wa Dae, an area reserved for the president. The telephone number on the sign, 02-77*-8888, does not exist.

Is it fake? The answer is yes. The whole real estate agent is fake. The drawing and the sign are also fake. It turns out that they are an installation work by an artist. The fact that the site of the building sits just next to an art gallery adds extra, delicate resonance.

The creator of the work is Oliver Griem, a 46-year-old German video installation artist. Griem, who has worked in South Korea for 14 years, says his intention was to express the absurd paradox of redevelopment by installing a structure like a real estate agent’s office on a construction site.

“My aim was to surprise people by showing them a plan for redevelopment next to Cheong Wa Dae, thereby giving them a new sense of the contradiction of redevelopment,” he says. “I live in Bogwang neighborhood, and when I saw the Hannam New Town construction project going obstinately ahead recently despite opposition from the people living there, I thought of creating this work.” Griem added, “My inspiration for using a shipping container also came from the temporary real state agent offices that spring up like mushrooms when redevelopment takes place.”

“The hardest thing to understand is how most South Koreans, who are always talking about tradition, like living in apartments and like to see the neighborhoods they live in being torn down as long as it brings them the promise of money,” says Griem. The installation is a space project by Tongui neighborhood’s Kunst Doc Art Gallery & Institute and will be demolished after “operating” until May 27. (02) 722-8897, www.fischkalb.com.

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