In March, the performing arts scene is ready for the spring season. Every day, performances are presented in numerous places which include public theaters such as the National Theater of Korea, Myeongdong Theater, Namsan Arts Center, Hanguk Performing Arts Center’’s Arko Arts Theater and Daehangro Arts Theater, private theaters like Doosan Art Center as well as small theaters in Daehangro. These performances are generating positive feedback and expectations from performance lovers. As the peak season in December came to an end, the arts scene was frozen for a while, waiting for the results of public funding. Under these circumstances, it’’s great to see artists reap fruits after preparing their works with hope and willingness during the winter season.

Festival Bo:m: An Exciting Lineup Encompassing All That Is Contemporary

The Festival Bo:m is about to officially announce the arrival of spring in the performing arts scene. Not only performance lovers but also those working for other festivals like me are attracted by the Festival. In 2007, the Festival’’s first year, the event was called the "Spring Wave Festival" but the name was soon changed to the "Festival Bo:m", using the Korean word bom meaning "spring." It is excellent naming because anyone can pronounce and remember it easily. Above all, the festival name generates great expectations for the season while it is also fit for the Festival’’s mission of presenting the "most avant-garde contemporary performances." Helped by the human network of Ms. Sung-hee Kim, its director, the Festival is a low-budget, privately funded event. Despite this, the Festival has led the audience to be convinced that the Festival presents world-renowned artists’’ works. In 2013, the 7th Festival is pursuing "Asia’’s greatest international multifaceted arts festival." An exciting lineup of programs are ready to take place for 28 days from March 22 to April 18, keeps the performing arts scene awake.

What draws the greatest attention is definitely Romeo Castellucci’’s On the Concept of Face Regarding the Son of God. Castellucci’’s performance was introduced to Korea for the first time when Genesis from the Museum of Sleep was presented at LG Arts Center in 2003. Afterward, his second work meeting the Korean audience was Hey Girl! which was performed at the grand theater of Arko Arts Theater during the Spring Wave Festival in 2007. Thus, it is the third time for Koreans to enjoy his work. Castellucci’’s nickname is "iconoclast" which means that while he basically uses the beautiful iconographic images from the Renaissance period, he removes religious comfort from these them. For example, he describes the image of Jesus on the cross as a mock suicide attempted by diving backward repeatedly. (excerpt from the review of "heaven" and "hell" posted in The Telegraph (2012)). This year’’s Festival will also screen the trilogy ("Heaven," "Hell" and "Purgatory") of The Divine Comedy written by Dante Alighieri. This generated enthusiastic responses during the 2008 Avignon Festival.

Sayonara (さよなら), a performance presented by the Japanese director Oriza Hirata and the cutting-edge android of Osaka University’’s Robotics Institute, will let us reflect on the convergence of scientific technology and the arts. Oriza Hirata, who has produced performances through Japan’’s small theater movement in the 1990’’s, has engaged in a variety of activities by leading the trends of Japan’’s modern theater as a playwright, a director and the founder of Seinendan, a theater company. For Oriza, "What is the theater?" is a new question arising after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. The android that plays the role of a caregiver for the sick should be regarded as an attempt to answer it. The acting of the android, the world’’s most sophisticated robot actor, stimulates the audience’’s curiosity, of course.

Among the programs of this year’’s Festival, I personally look forward to Young Jean Lee Company’’s concert called We’’re Gonna Die. Lee, who appeared like a comet in the middle of the 2000’’s, has become an enfant terrible of New York’’s avant-garde theater, winning the OBIE Award given to a new playwright. Revitalizing New York’’s theater scene already welcoming new trends, Lee has created a variety of performances, commissioned by theaters such as The Kitchen, The Public Theater and P.S.122. In its review of Lee’’s Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven in 2006, The New York Times even predicted that she would become another Quentin Tarantino. However, some of Koreans I know who live in the United States also harshly criticized this work, saying that a Korean-American director, who has no memory of Korea, suggests a distorted image of Korea and Korean women. I personally believe that for Lee, an American artist who tells American jokes and for whom Korean culture is rather a subculture, "Korea" has been used as an objectified story material rather than a heavy subject related to the question of identity. If I say that Lee should reflect on her identity as a member of a minority group seriously and continuously, would it sound like a cliché? Since then, her artistic activities have covered a variety of genres and fields and they have no longer been limited to Korea-related themes. I can’’t wait to see Lee’’s artistic changes and the Korean audience’’s responses.

Uijeongbu Music Theatre Festival Coming Closer to the Local Community

The Uijeongbu Music Theatre Festival, which will start on May 5 (It is Children’’s Day, an official holiday in Korea), is a performing arts festival hosted by Uijeongbu Arts Center. Uijeongbu City actively lends financial support to the Festival. The Festival was first held in 2002 and celebrates its 12th anniversary this year and its concept is to introduce "all genres of performing arts containing music." It is this concept that differentiates the Festival’’s performances from musicals. Although the Festival intends to differentiate its performances from musicals, it doesn’’t mean that musicals are excluded. In addition, the Festival also encompasses creative operas and popular music. Thus, the Festival sometimes looked disorderly. Nevertheless, the Festival has strengthened its solidarity with the local community thanks to its diverse programs sharing the common denominator called "music."

One of the greatest achievements of the Festival is the fact that it succeeded in attracting the local community’’s support by stimulating the residents’’ cultural desires. Indeed, residents of Uijeongbu and Gyeonggi Province account for 76% of the audience. To attract them, the Festival has expanded its venue to the parks and isolated areas surrounding Uijeongbu City while also preparing more programs in which residents can directly participate and enjoy. In particular, this year’’s Festival will present The Eleven Cats, a chorus musical for which about 30 citizen actors were selected through an audition. They have prepared the musical with great care every Thursday since the beginning of last December and the preparation work will continue until May, the month in which the Festival will start.

Meanwhile, the Festival will present Ukchuk-ga performed by Jaram Lee, a Korean classical musician suggesting the Korean model of music theatre. This work, which used to be presented by the Festival every year, is based on the original story of Mother Courage written by Brecht. This performance, which has great potential to easily appeal to everyone from around the world, has been introduced to many other countries to share the theatrical attractiveness of pansori, a genre of Korean traditional music. If you haven’’t watched the performance yet, how about taking this opportunity to visit Uijeongbu, to watch the performance and to enjoy the festival atmosphere?

Dance Is Their Lifelong Enthusiasm: The 2013 International Modern Dance Festival (MODAFE)

Another major spring festival not to miss is the International Modern Dance Festival (MODAFE) that will take place at Arko Arts Theater and Daehangro Arts Theater in Daehangro from May 17 to 26. Since its very beginning in 2003, the Festival has drawn great attention by introducing dance performances created by world-renowned choreographers from around the world, thus becoming a representative dance festival ceaselessly encouraging the development of the Korean dance scene.

A performance that deserves attention during the 2013 Festival is Babel (words) performed by C de la B from Belgium which was selected as the opening performance. The hottest two Belgian choreographers Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Damien Jalet created an installation similar to the Tower of Babel, in collaboration with the British sculptor Antony Gormley. This installation creates a new space on the stage and the dancers surround it to explore an illusion of humans who either separate or bring together others.

Another notable project is Living-room Dancers by the Swiss director Nicole Seiler. Dancers dance in the living rooms in different apartments of Seoul. A space like an apartment shows that dance is part of their life. Citizens walk down the street to discover apartments where the dancers are dancing. The audience can freely enjoy the performance, watching the dances with a telescope or an mp3 player. It could be called a site-specific performance but what is interesting is its concept that dance is not limited to a space but that it is ubiquitous, happening anywhere. For this project, an audition was held in early March to select dancers mastering different types of dance including tecktonik dance, break dance, hip-hop, tap dance, pole dance, hula, samba, flamenco, traditional Korean dance, ballet and modern dance. The project is part of the Festival’’s fresh efforts to come closer to the audience.


Interview with Seong Hee KIM, Director of Festival Bo:m
Interview with Young Jean Lee
Interview with Seung-chan Hong, Artistic Director of Uijeongbu Music Theatre Festival