ASEAN artists promote cultural exchanges

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The picture “Old Woman Loves What She is Doing” shows a Laotian farmer working in a rice paddy.

By Kim Hyo-jin

The ASEAN-Korea Center kicked off a unique exhibition Thursday that displays artworks showing daily lives of Southeast Asian nations.

Thirty three artists from countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and Korea are displaying their contemporary photography and media at the “ASEAN-Korea Multimedia Exhibition.”

The exhibition will run until Jan. 18 at the Gallery Moon of the Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) in Seoul.

The ASEAN-Korea Center organized the event as a follow-up of the 2014 ASEAN-ROK Commemorative Summit. It aims at bridging the cultural gap between ASEAN countries and Korea by introducing their daily lives captured in the photography and media art.

On display is a Thai photo of old traditional houses, a Singaporean photo of modern landscape, a Vietnamese photo of people lying down on hard-covered train seats and a Laotian photo of a harvesting farmer at work in a rice field.

“I hope through the Exhibition, the young generations of the two regions will get an opportunity to deepen their understanding of one another’s culture,” Chung Hae-moon, secretary general of the ASEAN-Korea Centre said, expressing his anticipation about the upcoming Exhibition.

“Promoting cultural understanding and exchanges among the people of ASEAN and Korea paves a good foundation for strengthening cooperation in other fields as well, such as in political, diplomatic, economic fronts.”

Since 2009, The ASEAN-Korea Center, an intergovernmental organization, has been promoting ASEAN economic and socio-cultural tourism cooperation among Korea and ASEAN countries — a regional grouping of 10 countries, namely Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.