Gwangju Biennales 10,000 Lives to Open in September
By Cathy Rose A. Garcia
Staff Reporter
The 8th Gwangju Biennale, widely considered Korea's biggest contemporary art event, will unfold in September under the theme ``10,000 Lives.''
The biennale, held in Gwangju opens Sept. 3 and runs through Nov. 7.
Massimiliano Gioni, director of the Gwangju Biennale, said the title of the upcoming biennale will investigate the relationships that connect people with images.
The biennale will feature art works by more than 100 artists made between 1901 and 2010, plus several new commissions. The exhibition will be turned into a temporary museum, where artworks and cultural artifacts are ``brought together to compose an idiosyncratic catalogue of figures and icons, faces and masks, idols and dolls.''
"The history of art is largely one of people looking at people, of eyes staring at bodies, of objects and figures created as surrogates of ourselves," Gioni said in a statement.
The title is taken from renowned Korean author Ko Un's 30-volume epic poem ``Maninbo'' (10,000 Lives). Ko was imprisoned in 1980 for participating in the South Korean democratic movement, and started writing an epic poem where he went on to describe every single person he'd ever met in his life, including historical figures and fictional characters. The work has been described as a ``magnum opus that reads as a personal encyclopedia of humanity.''
At the biennale, a diverse range of media will be showcased, particularly portraiture. It will deal with the ``obsession with images, and our need to create substitutes, effigies, avatars and stands-in for ourselves and our loved ones.''
"From ancient mythology we learn that images were created to capture the shadow of lovers. Images are the children of nostalgia; they keep us close to our dear ones, and keep them alive. It is this perennial state of iconophilia, this maniacal love of images, that we wish to examine in Gwangju," Gioni added.
Gioni, who is the director of special exhibitions at New Museum in New York, said the exhibition will examine the power of images, how they are ``fabricated, circulated, stolen and exchanged.''
The Italian curator is the youngest artistic director in the history of the Gwangju Biennale, and the first European to take on this position.
Gioni is the current artistic director of the Nicola Trussardi Foundation, Milan. He also worked as the co-director of the 2006 Berlin Biennale and director for Manifesta, the European Biennial of Contemporary Art, in 2004. In 2003, he was the curator of the Venice Biennale's special exhibitions.
The Gwangju Biennale, Asia's first contemporary art biennale, started in 1995. Since then, it has attracted international artists, performers, curators and critics throughout the years. In 2008, the 7th Gwangju Biennale, with Okwui Enwezor as artistic director, had no central theme, instead focusing on three parts: ``On the Road,'' ``Position Papers'' and ``Insertions.''
More details about the list of participating artists, programs and venues for the 8th Gwangju Biennale will be disclosed in April. Visit www.gb.or.kr.