By CHOI Yoon-woo (parodia@hanmail.net)..

Korean Theatre Review (October 2009)

The Seoul Performing Arts Festival (SPAF), which is to kick off on October 13, marks its ninth anniversary this year. Over the past nine years, the festival has emerged as Korea’s leading international event dedicated to performance arts, introducing productions from various parts of the world. It has grown both in terms of size and quality, with few people doubting its identity or future these days.

One of the reasons many overseas productions were able to receive positive feedback at the festival lies in the staunch belief of Art Director Kim Chul-li that performance arts should not be selected through word of mouth. Mr. Kim spends as much time overseas as in Korea. So far, he has only introduced productions that he had seen and liked personally, with the majority of them receiving positive reviews. That was the first step. Mr. Kim was reelected art director after his first three-year tenure early this year and will be at the helm of the SPAF until 2011. This year, some 40 productions, foreign and domestic, will be showcased at the festival. Tickets were already sold out one month before the festival.

It is hard to judge the SPAF’s reputation by the number of productions it introduces. What matters most is how the festival changes the environment in the performance arts sector. Rather than being a short-lived, one-time event, the festival must take root as a medium of creativity and distribution. The SPAF must take a look back on the past decade and consider its role in the performance arts sector. Kim says that so far the festival has focused on improving its substance, but now it is ready to focus on expanding its boundaries.

The following is an interview with KIM Chul-li.

You have served as an art director of the National Theater and the Suwon Hwaseong Fortress Theater Festival. But it is your first time managing a festival. Did you have any difficulties performing your new duties?

That’s right. At the National Theater, we had a team in charge of administration, and at the Suwon festival, I worked on a part-time basis. The biggest obstacle was financial instability. Several years ago, there was a financial crisis, and we’ve yet to secure stable funding. Another obstacle was misunderstanding in the performance arts sector, but things are much better these days. People thought that since we had money, we could use it to create good productions. They just didn’t see any problem in that. But in performance arts, you have to check things with your own eyes instead of trusting others. It requires much footwork. With overseas productions, you also have to be business-savvy to negotiate costs and adjust schedules. The better the production and the more famous the troupe, the more difficult it is to invite it to Korea. But people don’t understand that. Some also draw comparisons between the SPAF and the Avignon and Edinburgh festivals. Both the Avignon and Edinburgh festivals draw scores of visitors and tourists but they are completely different from each other. Moreover, the cities that host those festivals are profoundly different from Korean cities. Avignon is a small city with strong Catholic heritage, whereas Edinburgh is much bigger and a capital city. It has several attractions to draw visitors apart from the performances. That is why comparing the SPAF with Edinburgh would be difficult. In terms of content, it was hard for me to deal with constant demands that we balance the number of productions and genres. I have no idea why that matters so much. I agree that we need to try to achieve better results in that respect, but pursuing quantity was a big pressure for me. However, it was rewarding to learn that the productions that we introduced had received positive feedback and that the organizational structure of the festival had become stable enough. For a festival to be successful, both its artistic aspects and organization must be up to par.

We have already started doing that. For the 2010 festival, we have invited productions that can be co-produced. They are all debut productions. In other words, we have unearthed new productions through our festival. Co-producing new productions may sound risky, but our festival must be able to create good-quality productions. Once co-production gains pace, we will probably invite fewer domestic performances. Currently, we invite productions through public announcements, but in the future we might select them personally. The way we choose domestic and overseas performances will likely change next year.

Does that mean that the SPAF will pave the way for domestic productions that seek to debut overseas?

So far, the festival has played the role of a “window to the world,” but now it is ready to become a “gateway to the world.” In fact, over the past three years we have concentrated our efforts on publicizing our festival overseas. Once the SPAF gains global recognition, more performance artists will be willing to attend it. So far, we have been trying to make them think of our festival as an event that promotes good productions and to raise their interest in Korean productions as well. Nowadays they think of it as a festival that draws famous productions, which was are intent. But now we’ve reached the stage where we can promote Korean performances.

What is the festival’s role in the domestic performance arts sector?

I don’t think we can set a direction for art. But as long as the fundamental purpose of art is to develop a broad perspective on life and society, we can do anything it takes to express our perspective. But it is up to artists what method of expression they choose. We can’t force them to use certain methods. I think our festival will be more constructive if we help artists develop diverse methods of expression.

You have been to many festivals overseas. Which of them do you regard as the role model for the SPAF?

The Edinburgh International seeks to introduce top-quality domestic and overseas productions to Edinburgh residents. By contrast, the Avignon International showcases invited productions as well as productions that have never been shown before anywhere in the world. That’s why it’s hard to say that the latter targets Avignon residents. We can’t model our festival after just one of the above-mentioned festivals. We should use the advantages of both festivals. But since it would be difficult to draw a big audience in Seoul in a short period of time, like in Edinburgh or Avignon, we can hopefully use the example of the Paris International Fall Festival, which is operated on a seasonal basis. That’s inevitable for festivals held in big cities. So we should probably manage our festival in the way the Paris and Vienna festivals are managed but model its substance after the Avignon and Edinburgh festivals. Is that too much? (laughs)

Photography by SEO Dong-shin (Sow Studio)