Korean artists have donated their talents for various cultural events organized by a civic group to enhance public awareness of Korean women forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World War II, the group said Wednesday.
The group, called "The Citizens' Committee for Cultural Actions for Anti-war, Peace and Women's Rights," said it will launch a project titled "Please Tell" from Sept. 10 through 14.
It will consist of a photo exhibition, a concert and a film screening, all featuring the former sex slaves, the group said, adding many local artists and rank-and-file citizens had donated their time and talents for the project.
Historians say up to 200,000 women, mostly Koreans, were coerced into sexual servitude at front-line Japanese military brothels during World War II, as the Korean Peninsula was a Japanese colony between 1910 and 1945.
Japan has continually rejected South Korea's demand for talks on compensating the sexual slavery victims, one of the thorny issues between the two countries.
The exhibition at the Yongsan Art Center will display testimonies from the victimized women, their photos and records of activities by civic groups working to support the women. Leading South Korean freelance photographers and photo journalists from major local media outlets as well as Japanese photographers took part in the event.
A 2009 documentary film by director Ahn Hae-ryong will be screened on Sept. 11.
Titled "My Heart Is Not Broken Yet," the film portrays the plight of a former sex slave named Song Sin-do who had a decade-long legal battle demanding compensation from the Japanese government. The battle ended when Japan's top court turned down the demand by the 90-year-old Korean-Japanese woman. She is known to be the only surviving victim in Japan.
The film showing will be followed by a drama-style charity concert the next day, featuring female musicians who are based near Seoul's Hongik University.
"This is the first culture-arts project intended to document and increase the awareness of historical truth about sex slavery victims," Ahn, the film director and an executive committee member of the civic group, said. "It is meaningful in that ordinary citizens and culture-arts figures voluntarily took part." (Yonhap)