Busan Biennale
The Busan Biennale is a biannual international contemporary art show that integrated three different art events held in the city in 1998: the Busan Youth Biennale, the first biennale of Korea that was voluntarily organized by local artists in 1981; the Sea Art Festival, an environmental art festival launched in 1987 with the sea serving as a backdrop; and the Busan International Outdoor Sculpture Symposium that was first held in 1991. The biennale was previously called the Pusan International Contemporary Art Festival (PICAF) before it launched.
The biennale has its own unique attribute in that it was formed not out of any political logic or need but rather the pure force of local Busan artists’ will and their voluntary participation. Even to this day their interest in Busan's culture and its experimental nature has been the key foundation for shaping the biennale’s identity.
This biennale is the only one like it in the world that was established through an integration of three types of art events such as a Contemporary Art Exhibition, Sculpture Symposium, and Sea Art Festival. The Sculpture Symposium in particular was deemed to be a successful public art event, the results of which were installed throughout the city and dedicated to revitalizing cultural communication with citizens. The networks formed through the event have assumed a crucial role in introducing and expanding domestic art overseas and leading the development of local culture for globalized cultural communication. Founded 38 years ago, the biennale aims to popularize contemporary art and achieve art in everyday life by providing a platform for interchanging experimental contemporary art.
2018 Pumzi
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관리자 2018-08-21 11:51
Pumzi, Single channel video, 23min 52sec, 2009, Courtesy of the artist
Wanuri KAHIU
Pumzi
Kahiu’s film Pumzi (2009), shown at the former Bank of Korea building, is a 20 minute Afrofuturist allegory about climate change, state control and the creation of forbidden territories. 35 years after World War III, “The Water War”, museum curator Asha (Kudzani Moswela) lives and works in one of the indoor communities set up by the Maitu Council. When she receives a box in the mail containing soil, she plants an old seed that starts to germinate instantly. Asha appeals to the Council to grant her permission to investigate the possibility of life on the outside, but to no avail. She breaks out nevertheless, to go into the dead and derelict zone to plant the growing seedling. Kahiu has stated: “The film started as a joke. A friend and I pondered the possibility of living in a place where we paid for air. We invented the city, the virtual natural museums, and the people. [...] Pumzi is a visual ode to life.”