The Seoul Madang (2019)

FINDING SEOUL
Photography and Videography Exhibition Open to Public Entries

Findin g Seoul: Enjoying the City Together was a pre-Biennale event encouraging public participation before the opening. A total of 1,519 pictures and 100 videos were submitted, followed by a public vote to select the winners. It revealed which public spaces were popular by the masses and what kind of public spaces citizens dream of. After all, the city is of the people and by the people, and everyone should benefit equally from the city.

COLLECTIVE CITYSCAPE OF SEOUL

While Finding Seoul depicts Seoul from the perspective of citizens and the ways in which they can enjoy cities together, the Collective Cityscape of Seoul displays public spaces enjoyed by the public as selected by twenty-five district offices throughout the city. These districts come
together to comprise the landscape of Seoul’s public spaces. A strategy is needed to connect these twenty five distinct, fragmented components into a single, collective landscape. For this exhibit, each district office is represented by a 32-inch monitor that displays selected pictures and videos.

TEXTUAL COLLECTIVE, SEOUL
Collective Work by Minsun Kang, Imagina, Sooh and more.

The image of the city is also found in texts. Various texts in old and new media like proverbs, slogans, titles of films and TV dramas, poems, songs, and even modern-day slang hold its own time, memories, experiences, desires, and culture. They also reflect sentiments of the individual and the collective city. Some of these texts are long and detailed descriptions, some short and musical or even magical, conjuring up forgotten memories. These endless words, phrases and sentences from different times and places are collected to form a wide wall. And while some texts are shared by the masses, others are rare and foreign, likely to spark the viewer’s curiosity. Finally with the visitors’ sensual interaction the texts come alive to tell different collective stories.

PROJECT SEOUL

Project Seoul introduces two of the most definitive public projects that are currently being conducted in the urban level in Seoul: the Baeksa Village Residential Area Preservation Project and the Gangnam Intermodal Transit Center.

The Baeksa Village Residential Area Preservation Project is different from other ongoing residential projects in Seoul. First of all, while most large-scale areas are built upon a foundation that strays away from local identity and traces of the previous community, Baeksa Village aims to preserve as much of the original characteristics, spaces, scenery, community, local culture, and its traces as possible.

Second, this program is to create living spaces not only for local residents, but for incoming residents from all socio-economic backgrounds. And the purpose is not to simply design the physical spaces but to design a community that facilitates the lifestyles of the residents.

The Gangnam Intermodal Transit Center aims to take infrastructure models for various modes of transportation that runs through the heart of the underground city and connect them with similar infrastructures above ground. The main function of this project is to help urban spaces break away from horizontal growth and explore ways to facilitate their vertical growth as well.

Lastly, audiences can view video materials for a closer look at the various accomplishments of Seoul’s public projects
Seoul.”