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| Play "The Mission of Egg" is staged at ARKO Arts Theater through Sunday as part of the ARKO Selection program. Courtesy of ARKO |
By Kwon Mee-yoo
The Arts Council Korea (ARKO) presents five new plays as part of its ARKO Selection, a program supporting noteworthy new and revived performing arts productions.
ARKO Selection, launched in 2008, aims to discover and nurture new performing arts works. It has supported premieres of 206 shows as of last year. In 2020, 21 shows ― play, dance, traditional art, musical and opera ― were chosen for ARKO Selection.
The selected shows won a contest held back in 2019 and were developed for about a year before premiering.
"A total of 194 shows applied for the contest and about half of the entries were plays. The five chosen plays will premiere in January after a closed showcase," Hwang Geum-sil of ARKO explained.
"ARKO Selection, which enters its 13th year, began as a support program for new plays and then expanded to other genres, such as dance and musical. We are trying our best to establish the selected works and find new markets by selling copyright and being invited by overseas theaters and festivals."
This year's five plays are "Evolution of Love" by Gimjang Day, "The Mission of Egg" by the Blue Beard Collective, "The Way to Cannes" by Lapupuplay and "A Pain of Forgiveness" by Research Spectacle.
"This year's five selected works look at contemporary society from the border where people meet, clash and harmonize and raise awareness on various issues that are often shunned or ignored," Hwang said.
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| Play "Evolution of Love" is staged at Daehakro Arts Theater through Sunday as part of the ARKO Selection program. Courtesy of ARKO |
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the ARKO Selection plays are performed according to the level 2.5 social distancing guidelines, with two empty seats between each occupied seat.
Despite the pandemic, ARKO made efforts to reach audiences in various ways. Hwang said ARKO Selection signed an MOU with CGV in 2019 and introduced a donation system via Naver TV this year.
"This is a new challenge for us to experiment in online distribution of performing arts, encouraging the audience pay for online showings voluntarily. We are grateful for our loyal audience and trying to provide some kind of incentive for them," Hwang said.
"Evolution of Love" is a 12-chapter play exploring multiple aspects of love in documentary style, staged at Daehakro Arts Theater through Sunday. Lee Young-eun, director of "Evolution of Love," said the troupe looks into and researches a theme each year and it is love this time.
"We all give and receive love, but it is difficult to define clearly what love is. So we tried to find the answer by scrutinizing love from various perspectives ― philosophy, psychology, brain science, sociology and more," Lee said. "We looked at acts of discrimination, prejudice and violence committed in the name of love and concluded that love needs social evolution."
"The Mission of Egg," a modern take on mythology centering on a female narrative, is staged at ARKO Arts Theater through Sunday. Based in southern city of Gyeongju, the play revolves around a female archeologist and "hyangga," or Korean folk song from the Silla era, trying to find new elements from traditional materials.
Director Ahn Jeong-min said the play aims to shed new light on the patriarchy, defying gender binarism.
"Nulan Nulan (Most Precarious Situations)," staged at ARKO Arts Theater from Jan. 22 to 31, is set at a university facing restructuring.
Playwright Hong Chang-soo said he tried to portray universities in capitalistic competition.
"Their pursuit of truth is gone and they endlessly compete to survive. Professors and students alike lost their original aim and I wanted to look back on the value of basic arts and science and humanities," Hong said.
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| Play "The Way to Cannes" is staged at Daehakro Arts Theater from Jan. 22 to 31 as part of the ARKO Selection program. Courtesy of ARKO |
"The Way to Cannes" revisits Korea's modern history of the late 1990s at Daehakro Arts Theater from Jan. 22 to 31.
Set in 1998, the play revolves around a spy sent from North to South to find South Korean films and a former national security agent who lost his job because of the Korean financial crisis. They join hands to make a movie and they clash on everything as they come from different ideological backgrounds.
"The two agonize over their beliefs and existences as they experience a change of regime," writer Cha Geun-ho said.
"A Pain of Forgiveness" by Research Spectacle, staged at ARKO Arts Theater from Feb. 19 to 28, deals with refugee issues.
Back in 2018, some 500 Yemeni refugees sought asylum in Korea and the play questions the consequences of forgiveness and exclusion.
Actor Lee Dong-jun, who plays sociologist Sang-yo in the play, said there are people who research and dig into social issues even after most others forget about it.
"This play will provide food for thought ― what happens after social issues and who sticks to those issues," Lee said.
