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opening a new chapter for the gwangju culture and art scene, the KUNSTHALLE GWANGJU is a social experiment that aims at attracting direct participation from all visitors. thus the visitor is not merely consuming art but becomes a part of the artwork itself. to generate a true cultural incubation the transformation from passive perception to active involvement is at the very core of the KUNSTHALLE GWANGJU concept.

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Love from a Mama and a Papa

Two years ago I visited an art gallery in Kwangju, there on a big wall was this painting of a flower which reminded me of a 3D flower sketch my son did for a collage project. The next morn-ing when I got up this flower was still so fresh in my mind that I decided to try to paint it myself. So I did and ever since that day I’ve been painting any-thing that my eye catches.

At first I did it just for fun and a new hobby but now I’m actually studying art because I’m thinking of opening an art class when I go back home to South Africa. Recently I have em-barked on joint projects with my hus-band so that I could become more involve and practice in enhancing our skills together. He does enjoy the art but observing gives him more pleasure than actually getting off the chair away from the computer to engage with me and our “brush” friends”.

We hope we bring some joy to anyone interested in the conventional style of painting and to remind people you are never too old to learn. It took a yellow flower to discover my talent.

Thora & Errol Patience email: errolthora@yahoo.com

6FOUNDER / Joe WabeEDITORS/ Hannah Messmann, Amanda Hollingworth, Andrea Galvez, Eleny Rosado, Lorryn Smit, Frank McKinleyART DIRECTOR/ Joe WabeCONTRIBUTING WRITERS/ Leigh Hellman, Daniel Luzio, An-drea Galvez, Karyn Johner CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS/ Evelyn Curry, Hyein Lee, Lindsay Nash, Thora & Errol PatienceMEDIA/ Odette Wessels, Lorryn Smit ADVERTISING/ Joe WabePRINTING/ Alex J. Hwang WEBSITE/ artelemento.comEMAIL/ email@artelemento.comSPECIAL THANKS/ To Kyong Hwa Jung from the Kunsthalle pro-ject for all her help and hard work.

Cover art by Hyein Lee

I WOULD LIKE TO THANK EVERYONE WHO HAS FURNISHED INFORMATION AND MATERI-ALS FOR THIS ISSUE. UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, ARTISTS FEATURE IN ART ELEMENTO RETAIN COPYRIGHT TO THEIR WORK. WE WILL BE PLEASED TO CORRECT ANY MIS-TAKES OR OMISSIONS IN OUR NEXT ISSUE. WE WELCOME EDITORIAL SUBMISSIONS; HOWEVER, RETURN POSTAGE MUST ACCOM-PANY ALL UNSOLICITED MANUSCRIPTS, ART, DRAWINGS AND PHOTOGRAPHIC MATERIAL IF THEY ARE TO BE RETURNED. NO RESPON-SIBLITY CAN BE ASSUMED FOR UNSOLICITED MATERIALS. ALL LETTERS WILL BE TREATED AS UNCONDITIONALLY ASSIGNED FOR PUB-LICATION AND COPYRIGHT PURPOSES AND SUBJECTS TO ART ELEMENTO’S RIGHT TO EDIT AND COMMENT EDITORIALLY.

“The greatest treasures are those invisible to the eye but found by the heart.”

What is beauty? There have been hundreds of philosophers, writ-ers, designers and a hand full of others that have attempted to define it, and I’m sure this is one of the greatest impossibilities of life.

There are sayings, expressions, poems that try to transmit the meaning of one of the most abstracts ideas in our vocabulary, our world and in my opinion they aren’t able to do so.

I certainly don’t have an answer either. It’s true what they say “beauty is in the eye of the beholder’, and in this issue you can have an idea of what I think is beautiful.

Like Bumblebee in the movie Transformers, I’m not able to speak much, but I’m able to express what I think is beautiful through someone else’s voice. In Cuatro, Evelyn, Hyein, Linsay, Leigh, Daniel, and everyone else did that for me.

Enjoy beautiful.

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EVELYNCURRY8 HYEINLEE10 LINDSAYNASH14 YUJINJUNG16 DESERTS18 DAILYCODI20 LIFE,DEATH&ASIDEOFKIMCHI22 WITHHELD25

Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. Opinions expressed in articles are those of the author. All rights reserved on entire contents. Advertising inquiries should be directed to email@artelemento.com

8

Evelyn CurryFrom the age of a young child, I have looked through the fantastic photographs within National Geographic. From a later age, it was travel books, such as The Lonely Planet. I imagined the day when I could travel to such places and see such wonders.

My photographs are a visual memory bank of my travel experiences. I love color, repetition, nature: close up details and vast landscapes, candid portraiture and animals.

I found, I could never select a single photograph to represent my travel time in any one place. No one image could embody the fullness of my memory. I needed several images to do this. I began to play around with multiple images while studying at University, and have developed my collaged manipulated photographs.

They are a visual documentation of my experience in a place and to a place I have visited. Yet, they are wonderfully distorted and illusionary. Quite the opposite of our comprehen-sion of what a photograph is. A pho-tograph is known to be an accurate documentation of the real and exist-ing. I have followed in many others’ footsteps in manipulated the apparent ‘realness’ of the photograph.

I endeavor to create some visual form of my memories when I was in that place. My overlapping and erasing

and cropping add a three dimensional view to my two dimensional photo-graph. These manipulations tease and contort, forcing the viewer to take a second, deeper look into my image. Shapes and directions are created with my layered objects. A new image is in existence.

I guess, essentially what I am doing is taking the magazine of photographs that is a National Geographic edition and condensing the pages into one. One image. One photograph

Photos and photos and photos and photos.Seeking Essence.Sensory Ex

perience.Layer. Redo. Repeat. Ove

rlap . Redo. Repeat. Erase. Redo. Repeat. C ut. Redo. Repeat.

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Photos and photos and photos and photos.Seeking Essence.Sensory Ex

perience.Layer. Redo. Repeat. Ove

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10

Hyein LeeI am an illustrator and motion graphic designer in Toronto, Canada. Despite of what my mom says, it is a real job. I became an illustra-tor to avoid 9 to 5 jobs, instead, I work 10 to 4 (meaning 10AM to 4AM). The pay is very unstable; I have no idea what I’m going to do in January. I can start selling my inner organs to black market maybe. Surely, I don’t need 2 kidneys to live, do I? Sarcasm aside, I really love my work. It is great to make living doing what I love.

Few years ago, I used to be an engineer. Covered in dirt, I’d drive the red company truck do-ing dam inspections at the great Canadian oil patch in Northern Alberta. What was I thinking! Between photocopying giant spiders to play pranks on my co-workers and numbly staring at the total environmental de-struction, I realized I didn’t re-ally enjoy my job. What if I get hit by a monster truck tomor-row? In my dying breath, I’d re-gret not pursuing art.

Visual art wasn’t new to me. My mom was an art teacher and dad was a top interior de-signer in Korea. I’ve been draw-ing and painting most of my life and everyone including me thought I was going to be an artist. But once we moved to Canada things were different. My parents could not find a job in their fields without ‘Cana-dian experience.’ My math and

science marks were better than anyone in my class, so I started to pursue a stable career. I surely didn’t want to end up working in a store like my parents!

After wasting a long time in en-gineering field, I changed my career as an illustrator. People sometimes ask me if I ever regret it. To be honest, I sometimes do. My engineer friends bought an Audi, condo and dined in fancy restaurants, while I struggle to pay rent. Plus my shoes are all leaky. But I learned the hard way that material richness does not necessarily equal to happi-ness and a duct tapes solves a lot of leaky problems. I am truly happy right now, where things are going exactly I planned and dreamed them to be. Do you love making art? Don’t worry about anything else and just pick up that brush (or a Wacom pen) and go. The world is not as scary as the older generation

wants you to believe. The biggest inspiration in my art is deadline. As an inherent-ly and pathetically lazy person that I am, I do not get anything done if there is no deadline. Look at the modern life! Inter-net and social networking sites are so interesting. Why would I work to better my career when I can waste time on Facebook, looking up what my ex’s new girlfriend’s wearing? I have to trick myself to be busy; I book a lot of art shows a year. I book more than a human being can possibly handle, and say yes to most of illustration jobs. I do sometimes wonder if my work would be better if I take the time to polish. But really, does the work get better when you work slower? In my case, no.

My other inspirations are trav-elling, reading and staying up at night. Whenever I travel, my

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12creativity explodes. “In Bruges I & II” were painted right after a trip to Bruges,

Belgium two years ago. In that beautifully preserved Gothic city, everything closes at 5pm and all the tourists leave the city. I was travelling alone - like I al-ways do, not by choice - stroll-ing around the empty medieval city, eating Belgian fries, feel-ing lonely. I tried to capture that feeling in my paintings. “In Bruges I” won second place in the Courvoisier Collective Art Awards.

My most recent travel was to Berlin for Pictoplasma 2011. I was mesmerized by Eastern Berlin, where everyone is an artist, walls are covered with street art and construction sites moonlight as raves just like in the late 1990s. I made great con-nections too. I am invited to show my work in La Gaîté ly-rique museum in Paris hosted by Pictoplasma in December. Toronto is my favourite city, so I rarely see a place I want to move to. Vibrant and seriously cool Eastern Berlin made me want to live there. I am even learning German in preparations for the next year’s visit. I am contem-plating to do series of paintings dedicated to the beloved city of Berlin. My goal is to have a show there next year.

I also really want to visit Ko-rea. Ever since my family left Korea in 1995, I’ve only been back once in 2004. I only expe-

“Mom, I am invited to do a show in Paris. It’s a very nice gallery too! -“That’s great! Maybe it can

help you to get a REAL job.”

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rienced dark and poor Korea in my childhood, and I want to experience fun. I’ve never been to the famous Hong Dae area, and I want to go one day. I look forward to what reverse culture shock can bring to my work.

I wish I had cooler past time ac-tivities, but reading is what I do mostly. Not only that I love read-ing, but I think it helps me de-velop a quirky sense of humour. I believe it’s artists’ responsibil-ity to reflect what’s going on in the world around them: socially, politically or culturally. I espe-cially love science fiction. I love reading about monsters, aliens, clones, nuclear holocaust and outer space. It seems as though

we are living in an apocalyptic world with global warming, sub-prime mortgage crisis and all. Sci-fi gives me hope and let me dream a little. Monsters I paint are inspired by sci-fi. I dream of the day I get to paint sci-fi book covers. I know my style is not traditional sci-fi illustration, but I believe I can bring something fresh to the genre.

Nighttime is when I am the most inspired and focused, hence I usually work at night. It’s something I have to fix. Work-ing at night has been bad for my health and social life. The bad habit of working at night is very hard to kick because night is so much fun. All kinds of magical

things happen at night when owls come out. When 3AM hits, all my insecurities go away and I can paint, paint, paint. I love being acquainted with the night.

I just finished my Master’s in Design three weeks ago, so a lot of things are up in the air. If you are in Paris in December, please do check out “Pictoplasma: Post-Digital Monsters” show that I am participating in. I am also collaborating with a ceram-ic artist, Alexx Boisjoli (rcbois-joli.blogspot.com) to work on one hundred limited edition art bottles. If things go well, I have a lot more shows planned in the year 2012.

Please check my blog, hyeinlee.blogspot.com for upcoming news!

14

Lindsay NashThat’s my name, and I love to photograph people.When I am in a new country, I tend to point my camera at the faces I see rather than the landscapes or tourist attractions. In Vietnam, the women who hawk their wares on the street. In Cambodia, the children who spend their days speaking English to visitors amidst the sitting stones.

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In India, the woman who walks the mountain paths near her vil-lage carrying a rabbit.

One thing I’ve learned from my travels is that people are just people. Some are beautiful. Some are kind. Some are proud. Some humble. Some warm. Some silent and staring.

I like to capture people being people, in their everyday lives, in their everyday form, in their everyday world. We are not sim-ply from this place or that. Stars and stripes or maple leaves or the red and blue taegeuk do not define us.

At the end of the day, we are all just trying to survive –an adventure realized or a dream closer. Whatever it is that makes you fall into bed at night with a deep sigh and a hint of a smile.

I like to capture peo-ple being people, in their everyday lives, in their everyday form, in their every-day world.

“ ”

16

Yujin JungShe is the petite woman behind the big mystery that is Kunsthalle. To many people, Kunsthalle is nothing more than a strange orange container taking up real-estate on a prime corner of downtown. To those expats that may have ventured to a flea market or music concert, the understanding may have grown to include words like “location” or “venue” or any other kind of empty space that is easily shaped to many purposes.

But it’s something altogether more for Yujin. She’s been there from the begin-ning. Her husband was involved in the initial negotiations between the min-istry of culture, sports & tourism and the Germany company that built the green structure that is Kunsthalle, so really this is a long-term family affair. She knows what it’s about.

She agreed to tell us all she knows, and sat with AE for a one-on-one to help educate the community on what Kun-sthalle really is.

AE: For those unfamiliar with Kun-sthalle, what exactly is it and how is this related to the future Cultural Center?

Yujin: Well, KHG is a multi purpose art and event space and also serves as the new home for the ACC Info Center. The idea was to give the Gwangju peo-ple a taste of what the ACC will be like once it’s construction is completed in 2014. Once the ACC will be completed the KHG will probably be moved to an-other location.

AE: Other than events and exhibi-tions, what services, if any, do you pro-vide the community?

Yujin: The KHG has also become a social spot for a lot of people and pro-viding a place where people come to, to just meet other similar minded people is also a key service for us. We also help Korean artists to go abroad through our residence program and we opened a KHG show room called the “Gwangju Pavilion” in Germany so that the whole KHG and ACC project becomes more well-known abroad. More spaces like this are planned for the next years in different culture hot spots around the globe.

AE: There seems to be much involve-ment from foreigners in Kunsthalle. What this the original design or did it occur organically?

Yujin: As mentioned before the basic design and concept came from a Ger-man company and my husband who acts as advisor to the ministry of culture sport and tourism is also a foreigner. So there surely is a certain “foreign touch” to the place. But that was also the idea, to create an international place where diverse cultures come together. And af-ter all it is the ACC (Asia Culture Com-plex) and not the KCC (Korea Culture Complex) which already shows that the place was always meant to be “foreign” to some extend.

AE: What will happen to the Kun-sthalle once the Cultural Center is completed?

Yujin: …it is likely to be moved from the current location. Where to and if the concept and content will change is not yet clear. It will also depend on how popular it is at the time and what the Gwangju people want, I guess.

AE: Do you think the new Gwangju Cultural Center will affect in a nega-tive way the local artist since artists from all over the world will be coming to Gwangju?

Yujin: No, the opposite should be the case. If you believe the local artists can only survive because they have no real competition (if you want to call it that) than you may be right. But we believe the Gwangju art scene has a lot to offer and show to the world and it will blos-som even further with the opening of the ACC. Already we have a very posi-tive response from a lot of the local art-ists. But of course in such a big project you can never make things right for all people…

AE: If someone wanted to get in-volved, what are the avenues to do so

by Andrea Galvez

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other than just attending events? Do you need volunteers? If so, what back-ground?

Yujin: Volunteers with a good motiva-tion and some skill are always good and we already have some. Some people just came up to us and wanted to work with us and we were happy to welcome them. The background is not so important. The motivation, attitude and of course the skills are more important to us. And we need people with all kinds of skills, though good communication skills and interest in culture and art are surely helpful if you want to work with us.

AE: What is coming up on your cal-endar that the art community should know about?

Yujin: On the 11th of November we have a solo-exhibition of the young tal-ented artist Brian Hunter from Canada. He will show all his new interactive art-works, which he intensively produced over the last few months. On the 18th of November we host a groovy indie music concert with 3 bands all from different Asian Countries. And on the 4th of De-cember we have an open talk with an artist who works with unconventional fashion and clothing. In the middle of

December we have another solo exhi-bition of the renowned artist Inkyung Kim with his huge installation. And the regular programs such as the movie night on Friday night in December and night flea market every last Saturday of the month continue. In addition we also have a big Christmas party as the last DJ+night of the year on the 23rd of the December. So there is really a lot going on at the KHG, right? (laughs) For more information about the events, please visit our web-site or our facebook page.

It really is important to me that peo-ple understand that the Kunsthalle Gwangju is not only a place for an ex-hibition likes a museum or gallery The KHG is a meeting place for people who are always curious about something new. It is a “social sculpture” a defini-tion created through the art of the Ger-man artist Joseph Beuys who said that everybody is an artist in some way or another. Anybody can participate in all our activities and through this social ex-periment with all the different people in the end we hope to create a new kind of atmosphere that people could so far not experience in Gwangju. So are you ready for a small change in your life? ;-)

It is a “social sculp-ture” a definition created through the art of the German artist Joseph Beuys who said that eve-rybody is an artist in some way or an-other.

“ ”

by Andrea Galvez

Kunsthalle is, generally, in German speaking regions a term for a facility mounting temporary art exhibitions. It literally means “art hole”.

18

DesertsDeserts. Perhaps when you hear the word, you think of the Sahara, or the Gobi, or the Arabian—all vast, glorious locales in their own right. But if you happened to be in Gwangju on a Saturday night in the company of good friends and live music, and you heard the word “Deserts,” you might ask “Where are they playing?” or “When are they playing?” or “Why the hell are they playing again?”

by Andrew Vlasblom

As a rock music band, Deserts played numerous venues in Gwangju and throughout Ko-rea. We played to audiences ranging from 200 to 10 people. We changed our band line-up—twice. We booked a gig for Jeju Island on a weekend. We had numerous microphone difficul-

ties. We had poster issues. We snapped guitar strings, smashed a guitar, wrote 6 songs in 2 weeks, sounded terrible at Kun-sthalle, took pretentious band profile photos, wound up in a bar brawl, and at one point con-templated changing our name to Crazy Horse. I hope by this

point you’ve been enticed to read more, so let’s get the his-tory over with, shall we?

Our band’s roots can be found in a music night that I held weekly at the German Bar, where musicians would come together and cover well-known

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by Andrew Vlasblom

songs or improvise new tunes on the spot. Matt LaPlant, Brian Dendy, Michael Paul and Se-Beom Park were regulars at the music nights, and we found that our collective musicals styles jived quite nicely—or at least to a manageable degree. We de-cided to experiment as a band together, and after a couple of practice sessions, already had a few songs ready to go.

Within three weeks of our first practice, we had our first private gig, which was well-received. Ramsey Kyles, also a prominent participant of the music night, and Kenny Megan were in at-tendance, both of who would effectively replace Brian Dendy and Se-Beom Park in the future. The classic line-up went on for a few months, and we toured Ko-rea to small and large crowds, always to a good reception. The glory days ended when at last

Brian returned to the U.S., and Se-Beom was required to go to the army. So, we went on a peri-od of hiatus between November ’10 and March ’11.

In early March, we started talk-ing about reassembling the band with Ramsey Kyles and Kenny Megan, who would replace our lost band members. Practice sessions went quite well and the two talented musicians proved enthusiastic to learn some of our songs, while writing some new ones as well.

Now, in October, Matt, Ramsey and I have started writing songs featuring a new influence—that of Megook Movement mem-bers. Our songs will feature a mix of rap styling with instru-mental bits and lots of synthe-sizer overtones, so while the music will definitely sound dif-ferent from that of Deserts’, we

will retain the musicality—the beauty of live music with instru-ments and vocals.

Deserts was a boat that I am glad we could board, rock, and dock. To say that there were no problems would be a lie—we had tension sometimes as most bands do. But we were fairly tight as a band, and our friend-ships overruled whatever ten-sions might arise within. With the help of our friends and a nice bit of alcohol, no major is-sues arose that couldn’t be re-solved. The bonding can’t be forgotten, nor can the songs, which you can check out on Myspace or Youtube if you like. The future looks bright for live music in Gwangju, so stay tuned for news about our new band’s upcoming gigs.

Nobody really agreed on any name, but as Michael was stuck on Deserts while we were still thinking of other names, Deserts we became.

“ ”

20

DailycodiWhen I saw the Dailycodi announcement on the Kunsthalle website looking for models I thought that playing fashion model for a day could be fun. Soon I would realize that this fashion show was not going to be like any other fashion work I had done in the past, but it took me much longer to understand what the project was all about.

Probably, if I could read Ko-rean I would have been able to read the information displayed in dailycodi.com, but I only looked at the photos. After a few practice sessions and few talks with the thinking head, Andeath, I understood that this show was not much about fashion but more about creating a visual impact through move-ment, expression and music us-

ing clothes and accessories in unusual, unexpected ways. The clothes were used as a mere tool to create a very much surrealis-tic fashion show. Or at least, that was my -ongoing- interpreta-tion of the show.

Artist and designer, Andeath, asked participants to commit to 3 practice sessions a week, each of them would take between 2 to

3 hours, until the performance day, which was September 2nd. This show had been scheduled as one piece of a bigger puzzle, the Kunsthalle dingsdabumsda opening party.

This was quite a lot of time to volunteer, but I still was enjoy-ing my summer vacation, so that was one of the reasons I de-cided to stay to the end.

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I really like the atmosphere and positive vibes in the Kunsthalle, it is one of my favorite places in Gwangju, and I personally think that is pumping up the artistic vein on this city. I have been bitter about how little there is in this city to do or to partici-pate in, so I thought, if given the chance, I should contribute with my granito de arena (grain of sand).

Andeath was very ambitious about getting everything to per-fection for the performance, but at the same time she allowed the models to shape the final prod-uct. She would meet at a mid-point between her preconceived idea from previous works and the fresh input (a humble word for talents) from all of us, which often resulted in colorful cam-era mementos to treasure and share.

The models were an amazing bunch of fun people and most of them spoke English in a very natural and pretty relaxed way, which of course, not only helped me to follow directions (sometimes literally) but also it gave the opportunity to par-ticipate and get more involved than usual. The vibrant and open-minded atmosphere at the sessions nurtured everyone’s creativity. Andeath´s assistant, Noel, punctually kept us up-dated of schedules and changes. Not an easy task since we were about 15 models in total with all different personal agendas.

I have to admit that at times I thought, ¨This is weird stuff.¨ When I brought my 4 year-old daughter to one practice ses-sions, she was a little scared at the look of some models, spe-cially the girl in green, with her face covered with a rag wearing her glasses on top of it. But af-ter the first time, she was fine and named the project the ¨silly clothes¨ place, so she could un-derstand easily where we were going. Her favorite model was the one girl wearing 7 nickers

over the trousers (on a line, no on on top of each other!).

The day that the music -percus-sion, synthesisers and a piano- was added everything seemed to magically fall into place. The last ingredients added to the cauldron on the opening day was a psychedelic decoration and stroking lighting effects to provide our very diverse au-dience with an original and unique experience.

I have to admit that at times I thought, ¨This is weird stuff.¨

22life, death and a side of kimchiby Leigh Hellman

“Teacher?” Middle of roll-call. No raised hand—just an impatient voice that presses everything with the same urgency. “What?” A pause for the language barrier. I give him a beat to assemble his sentence before I start ignoring him. I have a headache and secretly hope it falls apart in his head rather than tumbling across my class-room. “전쟁.” No dice. YH is lazy but consistent, so I give him points for that. He offers me the same intentioned, if slightly shorter, pause. “미국 가?”“I don’t know.” I keep my an-swers clipped and honest.

I don’t look back down at my clipboard because I know he’s not finished.

“같이 가자.” A leapfrog of giggles and I roll my eyes. YH would be the one to say that. With him I can’t differentiate between sincerity and mockery. YH doesn’t mean harm, but he doesn’t mean particularly well either.

I think, not for the first time, about what war would mean for my students. Imminent—as it has been for two and a half years now. I can’t form a clear picture of it in my mind. I see vignettes from the original—still the only—Korean War or scenes I’ve probably filed away from overzealous Hollywood war epics. Bloodstained school uniforms, slow-motion bursts

of wood from where the bul-lets slice into our old doors and walls. Noble charges, last stands, sand and dust and a deafening silence that really hooks the au-dience. But that’s not war. Not real war.

Even the loops of footage streaming in from 연평도 aren’t real war to us.

I have no idea what that is or what it would be.

YH smugly congratulates him-self amid his cluster of friends, all seeds from the same rotting apple. My rotting apple, but I still taste the bitterness. I resume roll and wonder if I imagined the hint of uncertainty, of inno-cent fear in his interruption.

I wonder what YH sees when he thinks of war. What he sees when he thinks of danger in his life. Can he imagine finality like

that?

I can’t imagine finality for any of these boys, ripe and sour alike.

Then one boy is twisting an-other’s arm and thoughts of war and ends trickle back to the edge of my mind.

KS died in the fall.

I am the last to know. I don’t know why it surprises me. I un-derstand my school’s subcon-scious; I know its motivation to stifle as many opportunities for unfavorable judgment as possi-ble. Maybe I’d just been forgot-ten in the sweep of things—as I often was, even now. Or maybe they hadn’t thought it relevant to tell me. After all, it was prob-ably something I wouldn’t care about.

But I do care about it.

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A teacher lets it slip during a car ride. “The school has to be care-ful these days to let the third graders leave early.”

“Why?” I ask it reflexively, not fully committed to the conver-sation.

“Because of that student who died.”

The sentence rolls out casually, wrapped in only half a thought. My ears buzz low and I swallow a laugh. I’m not so sure that this is one of his awkward jokes.

“What happened?” Maybe this isn’t something I’m allowed to know, but the teacher keeps talking.

“He fell in the water and died.” There is more to it, of course. He tells me what he heard from the administration. The tale flirts with a subtle implication of

badness in that student, a faulty moral compass that led him from the guidance of his school to that cold river path.

I keep thinking: It must have been so cold that night.

“Who was it?” I flip through snapshots of third graders I’ve seen recently. I am suddenly, painfully aware of how little I see those boys now—boys who I saw weekly for a year and a half—and how they really could be up to anything and I’d never know it.

The teacher isn’t listening; he’s racing to make a left-turn ar-row. Once we’re safely through, I repeat my question. He shrugs.

“I don’t know.” A lump of rage rises out of the bottom of my stomach. How can he not know which one of our—my—stu-dents is dead?

“It happened a while ago. I can’t remember.”

Pieces start to fall into place. “When did it happen?”

“Two, three months ago. I’m not sure exactly.”

I nod mechanically and feel the strangeness of the movement. It amplifies the strangeness of eve-rything else.

Another teacher answers my chat message later. She writes his name: KS.

KS, KS, KS. I run it through my memories, certain that it’s familiar but still missing some necessary clue to this unwanted mystery.

The lump pulses with guilt. Guilt for my impotency, guilt for not protecting my boys but mostly guilt for not being able to match a damn face to a name. Guilt that one of my babies is dead, and I can’t even remember who he was.

I remember it later, possibly in the shower while my mind is on defrag for the day.

I remember my first Teachers’ Day, and how I was the only teacher they forgot to prepare a corsage for. I remember his disbelief, his disgust, and how he raced off and reappeared five minutes later with some poor sucker’s pilfered flowers. I re-member how he mugged for our picture. I remember how I indulged him.

He must have been so afraid.

I remember his class, one of the lowest level classes I taught. I remember how he knew maybe five words in English and em-ployed two of them to keep the class in-line. ‘Shut up’ is a peren-nial favorite with my low boys.

I hope he wasn’t in pain.

I remember patting him on the shoulder one day and him winc-ing. When I asked what was

I remember how he knew maybe five words in English and employed two of them to keep the class in-line. ‘Shut up’ is a perennial fa-vorite with my low boys.

“ ”

24wrong he pulled back his col-lar, exposing gashes across his shoulder and down his arm. He mimed an accident and boast-ed about his part-time job as a motorcycle delivery boy for his parents’ chicken restaurant. I remember I shook my head and made him promise to wear a helmet and be careful.

“I don’t want you to die.”

I hope he didn’t feel alone.

I remember his first day in class, a transfer student near the end of my first teaching semester. I remember our first Christmas party and how I offered stu-dents cards to make for me. Out of 800 or so students, he was the only one who did.

I remember him whispering to the co-teacher. When I asked him about it he turned away without saying anything. She told me later that he’d wanted to know if he could write, “I love you”.

When he gave me the card at the end of class, “I love you” was noticeably absent above his sig-nature—KS.

I hope he knew—knows—that I will never forget him.

I stare at the card now, taken out of its plastic cover amongst the compulsively organized memo-ries of my Korean life. Then I put it away quickly, worried that my tears might smudge the ink.

YH is late again. Granted, he’s not alone. But it’s almost finals week and I’m not in the mood.

They stand in the back. Most of them sway idly, shifting from foot to foot. A few chat despite my warning looks. But YH props his book open on the edge of a desk and follows along. I know because I can hear his ob-noxiously distinct voice repeat-ing with the drone of the rest.

It’s more effort than he’s ever really made. I’m careful not to be impressed. There are seven minutes left and we’re pushing through. The dance of fifth peri-od feels more like a slow gulag-trudge most days.

Then it’s there, like an exclama-tion point in the middle of end-less ellipses. YH’s arm stretch-ing, straining up, and I don’t know why but I acknowledge it.

“What?” I’m not as angry as I sound, but they can’t know that.

“Teacher, teacher!” I grit my teeth and consider that maybe he has nothing to say.

“What?” I press more, challeng-ing him to surprise me.

And he does. “I want to learn.” It hits me like a sucker punch and I’m out. A boy one year older than YH was feisty like that too.

KS wanted to be an actor. He was studying; that’s why he’d been in that city with that river.

I don’t know what YH wants to be, but I know that in this mo-ment I still have time to find out.

I struggle for my balance be-tween leeway and backtracking, strict and totalitarian.

“Alright,” I finally exhale with only one corner of a smile. “But you can’t sit down.” YH nods, bouncing his whole body. I pull back to the march—five min-utes to go.

After class the others throw glares at YH, a mix of envy and resentment for his grandstand-ing. I watch them shuffle out of class and suddenly feel how short my time with my boys re-ally is.

From within the ebb and flow of everything else, it’s so easy to forget how soon they’ll be gone.

artelemento

WithheldI base my judgement of myself solely on my actions. My thoughts and feelings have no place. That is how I knew it was possible for someone to love me when you ran away from me. Disappeared from view when I was still within reach. I will know how much you love me when you punish me. That is all that I am waiting for.

The ground with its tangle of lives is far below; the sky, closer than it should be, not offering the infinity it reaches out to. I am trapped within the hemisphere, not ascending or descending but merely in love. I thought only elation could bring me this high. But here I am now with no direction to go in.

I imagine that you are the wind, unseen yet always felt rushing by, trying to get away from me in your desperation to hide. And when the rain soaks the world below, tears for mine that never came.

Looking down, I’m only search-ing for you. But it doesn’t matter even if you are in plain view, for I won’t see you unless you want me to. Like the time you went out of your way to ignore me. Where did it begin? It was going so well. We met up a few times, I knew you liked him but that didn’t stop you from meeting me. Even though I tried to keep

by Daniel Luzio

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you: your destructive actions towards me are only done to emphasise my awareness of you. You need me to acknowledge you under any circumstance, no matter how much you think you hate me right now. If you’re so happy with him then why the sudden hostility towards me? I did nothing, much to my own regret. Because you made a mis-take by choosing the easy op-tion – of not rejecting he who asked, now you are angry with yourself. I am the cause of that anger because you need me too much and so the only thing you can do is to strike out at me. What would you have done had I really tried to snare you? It’s easier to hurt someone you love, isn’t it? It’s so difficult to dredge up even negative feelings for someone you are indifferent to. Ignorance is not indifference;

you at a small distance, I fell for you when your face was lit up in blue, sharing headphones, unit-ed by your music. Then, when I made a few casual moves, the empty space between us became defensively cluttered. Was I get-ting too close? Were you too afraid to get too close to me? But still you made another date with me. Until your “secret” made you cancel. Why couldn’t you tell me you started see-ing the other guy? You weren’t afraid to tell me about him be-fore. When we found each other after that, everything was still fine; you just couldn’t meet up with me due to your secret.

Days of planning and nights of anguish yet I didn’t know how to spur things forward. Not that it mattered. When I told you I missed you, you turned cold. I walked around the campus we shared searching for you. If I saw you one time, I would note the time and be there waiting the next week. You wouldn’t. I was living your past. In the cof-fee shop you waved and smiled but when I approached you, you knowingly walked away. When I waved at you outside the li-brary with your boyfriend you could still muster a wave back, surprised as you were to do so. I couldn’t do any more than walk away. When I caught you in the canteen, me shaking because of your distance, your answers were curt but still you could be friendly. Catching you off-guard worked. It was when you had time to prepare that things

fell apart. When I next mustered the courage to ask to meet you, you ignored me. It was over. You are a fantastic person but I know when over is over. And so it should have been until you saw me once, both headed in the same direction. At first you were cool, casual, then quicken-ing your pace when you knew I was still behind you. I halted to talk to friends, just for a mo-ment, to take the heat off you. You panicked, you pelted and a few seconds later you had man-aged to find impossible shelter. That hurt. Deep. I know as I saw the blood. Still, my first reaction was to smile. At least I knew I existed.

And I was pulled up into the sky into the stasis that I am now in. If I want out of this self-pity, I will have to do something. I am forcing myself to be pa-tient when I’m impatient and frustrated. However, I think re-lief is my biggest emotion. The privilege of loving you without displaying it is a warm pacifi-cation. My concern is whether to wait for the perfect plan that will never be or whether to do something rash now. Although anything I do will only make this situation worse, I still con-sider stupidity to be better than nothing. Because now you hide. You self-sacrifice and damage yourself purely to avoid me. Yet an apology is the one thing that

I won’t do.

I know only this much about

artelemento

it’s fear.

But you have trapped me, and I cannot move on, cannot let go of you until you let go of me. For as long as you hide from me, fear to see me, fear that any-where you go I might be there, you hold on to me. Suspend me in this hateful stasis.A bank of clouds is nearing me. A storm is coming. And there you are. You display yourself, your intent I will never under-stand. It is where we first dated, where I needed you to say good-bye. The clouds obscure all – you from me and me from you. Now is the time to open up my feelings.

I tear at the skin covering my chest but the shell is too thick, every layer a protection that is now my weakness. I scratch

and rip, fingernails searching for purchase until my casing is destroyed. I am de-humanising myself, but I must, to stop be-ing myself for as long as this will take.

The storm is gathering. The conditions are not yet correct, still I am stationary and I fear that you know what my game is. I tear out my heart but clasp it in my hands, not for safety, the time to reveal myself is not here.

The tension is building. The rains continue, betraying me, an outburst I am not prepared for yet and the lightning begins. The light bounces around me, as much trapped in the dark cloud as I am. Its will lasts an instant, my will is waiting. A lifetime of hiding from my own self has not prepared me for how difficult it is to restrain my heart within my hands. Its beating pummels my palms and I fight the urge to release myself. My unreleased scream feeds the tension that builds around me. I understand now that my pro-tection is not to stop the world getting into me but to stop me from howling out to the world. But you were the one who taught me that hiding is not the answer. This, finally, is an ac-tion. For better or for worse, it will justify a consequence. My consequences until now have been justified by passivity. My limbo is a result only of my lack of hope.

The light builds around me then

seeping into me until my fingers are forced apart from their mesh. It is the energy that explodes out of my heart that is the lightning, dragging me with it. I ride the lightning, headed towards you. I fight the acceleration of my emotions to reach out my heart towards you. I strike and then…

Finally I feel movement, barely a twitch, and I think that maybe I am falling. But it is a pull up-wards. It wouldn’t matter, either way; my only reaction would be joy, as it is now. I accelerate through the layers of the atmos-phere with such speed that my limbs are pulled into my body, forcing me into the foetal posi-tion. The effort of keeping the forces from crushing my body is quickly draining my energy. Soon, flames surround me; I am travelling at such speed. As I am finally pulled out of the at-mosphere and into the darkness of space, my skin melts around my body, still crushed into the foetal position. The heat radi-ates off my body and the skin, cooling, fuses into a solid mass surrounding me. I am nothing but a ball of skin in the depths of eternity, forced now to for-ever look inwards.

To cause this much pain means only one thing. You love me. I achieved that much.

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Last October artists from the U.S., Canada, Japan, Turkey, and Australia converged at Metro Gallery , Downtown Gwangju, to complete a draw-ing for the exhibition during the allotted time of 24 hours. All work for the exhibition started and was completed within the gallery space dur-ing 24 hrs. One of the mas-terminds behind this show was Gwangju’s resident artist and curator Michael Anthony Simon. The vibes at the gal-lery during the 24 hours the artist prepare their work was awesome. So much energy is needed in this world. Accord-ing to Michael there should be a number 2 show in the near future. If you missed it , second should be a must.

POP LIFETell Me More

artelemento

The event slammed up the stage at the Speakeasy around 8pm. Waygooks from Gwangju, came in with a need to speak with words of laugh-ter, sorrow, anger, happiness, fear, and strength pulling through their vocal chords so they could release the feeling and express it to the listeners in the audience. Each person that spoke had something to say, as the crowd went silent, and the flow of each speakers words ignited, the fire began to grow in the hearts of the listeners. Power, passion, ex-pression…”Finally we have a place to let go, be free.” If only for a moment each speaker is given a chance to let go, they have that moment where eve-ryone will listen. Next Slam-will be held in December.

POP LIFEPoetry Slam

KUNSTHALLE GWANGJU is a cultural showcase of the asian culture complex and a part of the platform of asian culture project.

artelemento

KUNSTHALLE GWANGJU is a cultural showcase of the asian culture complex and a part of the platform of asian culture project.

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KUNSTHALLE GWANGJU is a cultural showcase of the asian culture complex and a part of the platform of asian culture project.