Pass Through the City

Park Hyunki

Park Hyunki, Passing Through the City, 1981. Single channel video, color. 9 min 26 sec. MMCA Art Research Center Collection, Gift of Park Sungwoo

This artwork is a video recording of a performance by Park Hyunki, one of Korea's first-generation video artists who deployed a unique artistic language by combining Western art and traditional Korean ideas. He participated in Seoul’s burgeoning avant-garde art scene in the 1960s before relocating to his hometown of Daegu in the 1970s, where he developed a series of works using video as a medium and as well as a basis for spiritual epiphany amid the experimental art movement he pioneered. In the early 1980s, when color television broadcasts were first introduced in Korea, Park loaded an artwork consisting of a three-meter artificial rock with an attached mirror onto a large trailer and executed a performance while traveling through downtown Daegu to Maekhyang Gallery, located 12 kilometers away. This performance was broadcast in real-time within the exhibition hall using footage from security cameras installed around the city as well as an on-site cameraman. By interpreting video as an extension of the body, a mediation of the body, an object of contemplation and a transcendent gaze, the artist captures simple, flexible and conceptual thoughts about media in this performance.

Park Hyunki (1942-2000, Seoul, Daegu)

Park Hyunki pioneered a new horizon of Korean video art with the concept of incorporating Eastern spiritual culture into visual representations using existing technology. After graduating from university in the 1960s, he has participated in a modern art movement centered on new media such as video, happenings and performances with his colleagues in the city of Daegu. In 1974, Park began working with video in earnest after viewing Nam June Paik's seminal work Global Groove (1973). His major works include Passing Through the City (1981), Media as a Conveyor (1982) and Epiphany (1997). He has supported the initiation of the 1st SEOUL in MEDIA 1988-2002 (1996) as well as participating in the Media_City Seoul 2000 City: Between 0 and 1 (2000).

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This program offers daily screenings of 5 sessions on fixed schedule. You may reserve seats by registering at the link and selecting a screening date and session. Reservations for multiple sessions are allowed. Group reservations and selecting multiple days are not permitted.

Admission is free Please arrive at least 5 minutes before the screening time If you do not attend a registered screening without providing advance notice (contact@mediacityseoul.kr), penalties may be applied to future reservations

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