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I have never stopped doing or creating things. I always made art and went to art school, but I didn’t want to be an artist. Both of my parents were very talented and creative but art was not something sustainable for them. After art school I thought I’d be a better person if I got a real job with stability.I became interested in the graphic arts after someone offered me a job as a web designer. Not having much experience with Photoshop, I bought some books, and some pirate software and began my journey as a graphic designer. More than 12 years have passed since I began my career as a graphic designer and for a while after, I became very frustrated with the views of design that many of my customers had. Design is not pushing buttons and making things look pretty. There is so much more. When done right, design is an extension of the designer’s heart and mind and, consequently, deeply personal. At least, that is the way it should be.I left graphic design for a while, but the idea of making my own art magazine has always been in the back of my head. Coming to Korea, especially living in Gwangju with its own art scene, woke up within me my old passion, my real world. The world of colors, imagination, patterns, lines and creativity.Art Elemento is an attempt to break from the traditional way of reading what’s out there for the expats. It is a door, a break from the serious news and antagony of our work. There is a lot of talent out there that I want to be able to expose to this community. I want to break with the ste-reotype that every foreigner out on the street is either an English teacher or an exchange student. This is probably why they are here but it doesn’t identify them as what they really are.What we do here is not meant to be serious. I hate anyone that takes anything too seriously, and the thought of the art world being stuffy and elitist and something that’s out of a lot of people’s reach is wrong . Our work is supposed to be something to enjoy . It isn’t supposed to be about life and death (not that we don’t take Art Elemento seriously.)As long as I get reaction from people, I know I’ve done my job. Whether people love it or hate it, both are good because there is no defined rulebook. I try not to take myself too seriously and to put my best foot forward in everything I do. But I’m not trying to do it on my own. I’m very aware of the people who have supported me and who help me.I’m very excited about this project, because I love discovering new things. They give me energy and also, in a sense, I’m getting back to my roots.

I like to believe that at the end of the day we are all artists. Please recycle this maga-zine.

Enjoy issue uno.

INTRODUCTIONFOUNDER / joe wabeEDITORS/ hannah messmann, chelsea humphrey, aneta macnallyART DIRECTOR/ joe wabeCREATIVE DIRECTOR/ joe wabeCONTRIBUTING WRITERS/ matthew rehrig. , daniel luzio, hughie samson, doug stuber CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS/ leroy kucia, jen lee, doug stubert, brian hunterADVERTISING/ joe wabeWEBSITE/ artelemento.comEMAIL/ email@artelemento.comSPECIAL THANKS TO/ jane moon

cover design by joe wabe

I WOULD LIKE TO THANK EVERYONE WHO HAS FURNISHED INFORMATION AND MATERIALS FOR THIS ISSUE. UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, ARTISTS FEATURE IN ART ELEMENTO RETAIN COPYRIGHT TO THEIR WORK. WE WILL BE PLEASED TO COR-RECT ANY MISTAKES OR OMISSIONS IN OUR NEXT ISSUE. WE WELCOME EDITORIAL SUBMISSIONS; HOWEVER, RETURN POSTAGE MUST ACCOMPANY ALL UNSOLICITED MANUSCRIPTS, ART, DRAW-INGS AND PHOTOGRAPHIC MATERIAL IF THEY ARE TO BE RETURNED. NO RESPONSIBLITY CAN BE ASSUMED FOR UNSOLICITED MATERIALS. ALL LETTERS WILL BE TREATED AS UNCONDITIONAL-LY ASSIGNED FOR PUBLICATION AND COPYRIGHT PURPOSES AND SUBJECTS TO ART ELEMENTO’S RIGHT TO EDIT AND COMMENT EDITORIALLY.

ARTELEMENTO

art elemento

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

ARTELEMENTO UNO

JEN LEE9 BRIAN HUNTER13 DOUG STUBER15 HISTORY OF MY INK19 LEROY KUCIA21 WHITE DAY GIRL23

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jen lee

I’ve never really been good at writing about myself or my work, and I don’t think I ever will be. I guess that may leave something to be desired for some people, but I’m okay with that. I guess I would prefer for viewers to take my work as they see it. I like to tell stories and set scenarios or moods with my work, and if people fail to see that, it just means I have to improve as an artist. Really, I’m not trying to convey any sort of particular message. I just do what I do because I love doing it. Sorry for the in-convenience!

“

“

nabichan@gmail.com

art elemento

My idea of a self-portrait. This is what I apparently look like when I draw. No mat-ter how serious I get with drawing, I nev-er forget that it’s something I love to do and have fun with. Without that mentality, I think most artists would go mad.

“

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http://jen-lee.com

10

175 BEATS per minute is not something that you get to experience too much in Korea outside of one or two clubs in Seoul’s Hongdae nightclub district. However If you go to any major city in the world you’ll more than likely be able to find some sordid den of depravity with the wob-bling bass and searing snares of drum n bass music shaking the walls and making a throng of sweaty clubbers rock until the early morning hours.

This was how I spent a great proportion of my weekends in the first half of the last decade before making the mo-mentous move to the land of the morning calm (never has a name been so inappropriate). I first got hooked on jungle music when I was a teenager and started djing whilst at university in back in 2002. Somehow I managed to get some residencies in clubs pretty early on which is testament to the statement ‘it’s who you know, not what you know’ , because I was fucking awful. I didn’t let these little things like lack of ability get me down though and I’ve been lucky to enough to play across England and Korea since then.

A lot has changed to the scene since I was a spotty, sweaty teenager pulling silly faces on a dance floor. What was once an almost uniquely British sub culture has be-come a worldwide phenomenon with artists from all over the world raising the bar time and time again with im-proving production levels and innovative variations on the original theme of fast break beats layered over heavy bass and sub-bass.

Unfortunately this phenomenon has struggled to take hold in Korea over the years. After the closing of the legend-ary Cargo club in 2009, DnB has failed to find a regular home with a number of differ-ent venues being tested with varying levels of success. The Korean drum n bass scene seems to be mostly centered around the liquid (chilled out) sub genre which for me is great to listen to at home whilst drinking a beer but i think clubbing should be all about going crazy to heavy bass lines and plenty of nasty double drops. This is some-thing i try to bring to my dj

sets; sometimes it will work, sometimes it won’t but i’ve normally found the response in Korea to be positive. The Korean crowd often don’t know about drum n bass but when those beats start pounding out it’s very hard not to dance.

We’ll see what the future will hold for drum n bass in Gwangju, as it’s very much in its infancy (i.e. 2 short apperances so far) but if you want to come and check it out then MC Bar near Cheon-nam University Back Gate is the place to be on May 28. The Gwangju Underground crew are getting together to put on their second party and will showcase the best local expat dj’s playing various forms of dance music from House to DnB with none of the electro house tedium you’ll here at every other bar in town. Let’s start an underground music scene in Gwangju!!! It can be done.

dj skulfunk

art elemento

Started in late 2009 The Meegok Movement is a group of individu-als committed to promote Hip Hop culture in South Korea. The movement is currently involved in DJ-ing, rapping, producing, and has recently released their debut album “Listen and Repeat”.

Worth Green “Soju”

Inhale....I’m Billy ClintonExhale....na, I’m O.J. SimpsonMy murder victim is this beat I’m rippinthese drinks I’m sippin keep me imprisonedI feed me liquidObe, E, and then somelike Cruise and Kidman feed me prescriptioncan’t I.D. the victim fingers, teeth is missinburnt up skin yet again I win I beat the system!

12

I recently had, like, an ex-perience where, I started to have feelings I never thought I had, how I felt about kids, and how, I just didn’t like em, or I didn’t like to be around them, and didn’t, didn’t want none, well uh, this past

Saturday, my sister, she asked me to babysit my two nephews, and I agreed and the first thing I’m thinking is like, they don’t break my shit, yknow, I don’t want them to break my stuff, I don’t want them to touch nothing yknow they might just get on my nerves

I just don’t wanna be around kids but uh it was pretty cool that day, we like hung out, we uh took them out to eat, played video games, watched movies, and it was cool, like I felt like really good doing something for, yknow doing something for kids that don’t get muchLike my sister, she’s I dunno, it’s like, I know its kinda crazy all of a sudden I wanna have akid but I don’t think I wan-na, I wanna be more open minded to like, having a kid but I don’t think i should have one just yet

Brian Hunter

Pablo Picasso’s change of heart

A lot of my work is based on youth and masculinity. I was curious about how my age in-fluenced how people perceived my artwork. I wanted to find a way that I could have some-one else express my ideas but with an older (wiser) per-sona. I thought bout famous men in art history and pop culture and how we perceived them based on their celebrity. A lot of artists and musicians we celebrate as geniuses for their work leddestructive lives full of wom-anizing, drugs, alcohol and abuse.

“I wanted to pre-sent them in a more vulnerable situa-tion, such as confess-ing their intimate thoughts and strug-gles with parent-hood. I combined the famous artists with other”famous fatherly (and not so fatherly) figures from pop cul-ture;”

art elemento

Mick Jagger goes to court

Mike Brady freezes his fingers

“in her profile she named herself “anally sue” was calling herself a slut and asking for men to torture

her”

The morning I found out about my wife’s other life, I found the journal she kept about what she was doing

additionally since she started this on my comp I had her in-stant message conversations

pictures, screenshots of her public internet profile where she was wearing a slave collar,and in which every in-timate part of her body was displayed, including her re-cently pierced nipples

in her profile she named her-self “anally sue” was calling herself a slut and asking for men to torture her despite the fact that adultery and some of these things are defi-nitely amoral

nevertheless, Judge Hartigan declared all the previous men-tioned evidence as irrelevant, and wouldn’t even let me ask my then still wife about it in the courtroom

to add insult to injury, my wife had a warrant out for her arrest at the time of the trial the judge knew this, and did nothing

I remember my dad taking me ice fishing one winter

I remember my hands and feet being so cold that I couldn’t even, I couldn’t even uh, use my fingers

this is the time that I re-flect on now is, is him taking the time, cause do you think it was fun for my dad, lis-tening to a whiny little kid

uh, I doubt it very much

but he did, he kept me there, he didn’t yell at me or noth-ing, but I’m quite certain that he wasn’t enjoying him-self as much as if he was by himself but,

uh, that is pretty awesome thing that my dad did for methat I’m gonna always remem-ber

I don’t find myself doing the same favors for my children and I have to to give them what I feel they deserve brianhunter.ca

14

Doug Stuber is a poet, artist and musician whose life is not easy to explain in any one given media. He attempts to share his experiences via journalism, multiple art forms, music and by teaching. This can prove educational in both an English classroom, and as an example of how to live a life entirely outside the box, a persistent, gadfly, self-made life in which expression of emotion is paramount.

Doug Stuber

art elemento

Atlas Shrugged, BB #6

Lotus leaves in fountain pools behind the Metropolitan Art Museum reflect sun rays,but not in ways Monet would understand. Cellos ascend to bless the ears of diners from the donor class, while those lily pads and lotus landings resonate on levels only guessed at by geniuses and amateurs alike.

Room after room after room after room after room stun mere humans with the peak moments of nearly all the masters: ancientrelics full of universal hum.

Feeling visitors tear up, once cynical multi-cultural couplessoften in amazement.

The hoity-toity mingle with Asian tourists in a surreal scene Yves Tanguey would get a kick out of.

But it’s the quiet ripples in the pool out back, the tumbling leaf in the now-safe park, the sad chatter of the magnet peddler whose addiction isn’t clear, but whose profit must be small, that fill sensory memory to capacity.

16

Back when there was time, when one parent Was always there to guide a child, schools wereNot blamed for bad behavior, partly because there Was so much less of it.

One job per house meant Security, health insurance, a nest egg, and plenty for Suzie to go to college on.

Forget the bridge club now Dearie, everybody works. Corporate has found a way To thrive in the post-liberation era: reduce middle class Pay to the point of nudging, nay forcing the Moms to work.

It’s not about reduced free time, it’s about no time left toEven get to know our own children. Since profit is king,

The new world order is thus:

No assistance if the Dad lives With his child, No benefits to any temporary workers, No Labor jobs that pay a living wage north of the Maquiladoras,No wins for unions since 1980, No affordable day care For working Moms, No federal money for states with less Than seventy five percent of the welfare recipients working, No job training money left after building bombs, No incentives For employers to pay better, No company loyalty,

No profit Sharing plans, No safe pensions, No guaranteed retirement, No Social Security, No public transportation in manyTowns, No decent schools for low-income neighborhoods,No safeguards for the food we eat, No plan in place to Save the environment, No cash to save the mental hospitals, No handouts to the homeless veterans, and No jobs at all For those who work with their hands. None, zero, zilch, zip!

Corporate Suckered You Ladies

art elemento

Be aware that energy is life, save some for your kids.Be afraid that our minds are bent by news not books.Be awed by the healing power of the simple purple cone flower.Be amazed that after four short years she knows so much.Be awake before the bombs drop, before the money rules.Be agile: live in a town that walks and bikes to work and play.Be amused by ants and birds, goats and potato fields, lilacs and sycamores.Be angry only long enough to solve the problem, then move on.Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.

Ode to H

orace Mann

“Be ashamed to die until you have won somevictory for humanity.”

Horace Mann

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Tattoos: What is your first thought? Excite-ment? Fear? Curiosity? Delight? People all over the world have their own views and beliefs on tattoos. In different cultures, tattoos are a sign of power, shame, or just a fashion state-ment. My love affair with tattoos started around the age of four. My mother had been in the Navy, and she had been inked then. Tat-toos seemed just like wearing your favorite band or other novelty t-shirts. They allow people to know how you feel about life, mu-sic, and the arts with-out you ever uttering a word. Ever since I could remember, my family members, former military or old school bikers, were covered from head to toe. I saw ink slammed into skin daily, but my parents insisted that I wait. I had to be old enough to know the meaning of tattoos because they are perma-nent.

The history of my inkby Matt R.

art elemento

Waited I did, until I reached the end of the sweet age of innocents and virgin flesh. I was sixteen and had just graduated High School. My mother asked if I still wanted a tattoo. I gave a big “Hell yeah”. My first tattoo came that summer in “The Ink Box,” a dirty shack attached to a junk yard garage. Troy, who had to wait twenty minutes after he took his meds so that he wouldn’t have the shakes, used a pen and drew on my first tattoo by hand. I have Irish in my family and had been offered a football college scholarship, so it followed that I got a bad-ass little Leprechaun on steroids in front of a clo-ver. Thus began my love affair with tattoos.

Number 2 is for my frater-nity: After pledging for twelve fucking long weeks, my dedication was almost as high as I was and I was president of my pledge class. Our symbol is an outline of a crow holding a banner. Inside the crow are the letters AXP, for Al-pha Chi Rho. In the ban-ner is out Fraternity motto in Greek, which means “Be Men”.

Number 3, another story all together: My University roommate died on our couch. We initially thought it was due to a Heroin overdose, but he actually had Hotch-kins. Unknowingly, we had been watching him die of cancer for three months. That summer, I got all sorts of fucked up with Vicodin and Colt 45 when I got to my buddy’s house. He had his own tattoo gun and ink,

so, in memory of my roommate ‘Philly John,’ I tattooed the symbol of the Gravediggaz on my left thigh. The tattoo was self done. It’s not too bad, but I forgot to dot the “I” in R.I.P. I have left this uncorrected.

Number 4 is in memory of my real father: He was mur-dered when I was 5 years old. My father lived a hard life, which tends to catch up with you. I do not have many memo-ries of him, except that he often said, “Death is always behind you, so get up off your ass and live life to the full-est.” In memory of my father, on my right calf, I have a tattoo of the Grimm Reaper. He is rising out of flames and sticking his sickle into my flesh drawing blood. This is to remind me of my real fa-ther and to make me a better man than he was.

Number 5 has a fucking sweet story: So far, I have gone to 586 concerts, mostly of bands many of you have never heard of or at huge hippie festivals. I was at an All-man Brothers and Bob Weir and RatDog concert when I saw this dirty old hippie, and I was like I know that guy. It was Dead Dan, an acid drop-ping Volkswagen minibus liv-ing tattoo artist. This man has been around the world and back with the Dead. The guy was tripping balls but still 100% coherent. I started talking to this underground counter culture god. I rolled up a fattie and said, “Could you please give me a tattoo in honor of the Dead and the Allman Brothers.” Incredibly, he did! I love this tattoo, even more so because I got it from a 65+ year old man who

was high on acid.

Number 6 is purely in mem-ory of all the love ones I have lost: It is in Old Eng-lish lettering and says, “In the end, my friend, we will all be together again.”

Number 7 is a sign of dedi-cation. I started to walk down the same path as my father. I was getting heav-ily involved in the motor-cycle culture and joined my first Motorcycle club. Here I got my first Harley and got my first lower arm tat-too, black and gray flames on my left arm. On the underside of my arm is the word Hooligan in Old English because I was always be-ing called a fucking hooligan by the older guys. At that time, if you saw me scream-ing down the road on my Harley and saw that tattoo, you knew to get out of the way. continues page 27

“A stigma still surrounds tat-toos, so I am

not always looked at fa-

vorably, but I don’t care. My tattoo love af-fair continues.”

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Leroy Kucia

There are many aspects of con-temporary Korean society that have been influenced by the strong sense of tradition and history that have existed here for thousands of years.

Newer residents of Gwangju have the luxury of experiencing it as something new and complex. From the ornate constructions of Bud-dhist temples to the abundance of festivals and customs that are interwoven into the Korean way

of life, people should find some-thing that inspires them person-ally and use it to add substance to their lives.

Gwangju truly is a great place to live if you are an artist or individual with a creative per-sonality.

If I were to offer any advice to budding artists here in Gwangju, my best recommendation would be that people use the opportuni-ties they have here to adapt to and explore Korean culture through their work.

http://www.leroykucia.com

art elemento

As an artist, one of the main challenges that I face in Korea is appealing to a diverse audience using my work. I have to create a balance between my Western style ideas, while also incorporating

Asian themes in order to bridge the cultural divide.

“ “

22

It’s six minutes past eight on White Day, the Korean and Japa-nese version of Valentine’s Day.

Outside, in every convenience store, White Day packages have sprung up to cater for the unim-aginative or merely slack, allow-ing them to provide for their loved one.

I, however, am alone in a coffee shop, somewhere on the outskirts of downtown Gwangju. I am not the only one in here; there are a handful of others, mostly groups, female dominated. Typically a store for take-out coffee, others, including the random couple here and there, will fl ick in and out. But I pay little heed to these. There is only one pair in here accompany-ing my attention, though both are

girls. White Day does not exist in this coffee shop, at least not for the duration of my stay.

I focus in on the pair of girls, chosen with the intention of being random, but really as a matter of convenience, as they are within my fi eld of view. This detail also explains the prominence of the one girl over the other as, of the two, the sub-ject I choose is the one whose face I can see. Whilst a back may also be an interesting part of the body to read, tonight’s fo-cus really becomes all about our subject’s hands. I cannot hear any of the conversation between these two girls. Occasional words may drift over to me in a mo-ment of excitement between the two, but the meaning is lost under

the smashing of ice as the coffee shop assistants prepare coffee, the speaker that I am sat under which is playing distracting upbeat pop music in a normally relaxed environment, the general hub-bub of a coffee shop, and, ultimately, my own poor grasp of the Ko-rean language. The following is a twenty minute slice of her life, in which I shall try to understand as much about her as I am capable of.

By the time I take my seat, they are already fi nished with their coffee, their empty glass cups lie in the centre of the table. The place is well lit, even in the cor-ners, there is plenty of light, but they have chosen to sit, punningly, centre-stage.

White Day Girlby Daniel Luzo

daniels.crony@gmail.com

daniels.crony@gmail.com

art elemento

THE FIRST IMPRESSIONS

What is initially most striking about our subject is just how ex-pressive her face is. As we gate-crash her world, her face registers surprise very strongly. I need not stress that our pres-ence, we hope, is unknown. This is surprise at something her friend has told her.

It does not take long for her left hand to move up to her mouth and looks initially as if she is picking at something in her mouth, but is actually chewing her fingertips. She is glancing to the right and her friend creases forward, in laughter, clearly she has just told a good joke, hav-ing pulled the humour out of the recesses of the blank distance around her. A smile forms on her face as she pulls herself back into the reality she is inhabiting.

Conversation resumes, she still chewing away on her fingers. Though perhaps her fingers are searching, trying to pull out some more humour? Unsuccessful, her hand moves up to her eyes. She rubs as she speaks once again. The tactic works. Her friend re-coils in laughter, and successful, she pulls her hand away to look at her friend. But that is just tem-porary, her fingers exploring her mouth once again, her eyes open wide as she listens to her friend.

THE DROWNING

She listens attentively to her friend. Her eyes open and close as if breaking down the words into chunks that are easier to digest. Her eyes begin to glance around distractedly, no longer chomping away at those morsels of con-versation, instead deflecting them to the corners of the room. Her friend is animated, leaning in and pulling back out as she just sits

there. Only her finger, teeth and eyes are moving.

Her friend now pulls back, leaning far back into her chair, her right arm sticking out,crooked as she plays with the hair at the back of her head. Mean-while our subject is beginning to move her head around, as if bob-bing in the current, far adrift and lost. This has been almost a minute now.

But finally a chance to break against the tide - her hand moves away from the face to swim around a bit as her head pulls it-self up from the surface, however, it is nothing other than a breather, very soon she sinks herself back down as her friend picks up the conversation.

A moment later, her hand drops down to the coffee table, where it is picked up by the right. She is talking once again, and both hands begin a dance, bringing her back to the surface.

She is able to maintain eye con-tact once again, but that is not until she begins chewing her right hand.

THE DANCE

She brings her hands down, lean-ing forward as a puzzled look comes across her face. But as

she works through the issue, she raises her whole self up, confi-dence appearing higher she builds herself up. Her hands are ready to dance around in front of her once more, kept there in preparation, ready now to strike out against the world.

They are brought in front of her, language alone not enough to con-vey meaning, her fists are brought together, both index fingers raised to measure distance. With this, she carries an air of authority, her face assertive. Her hands break to perform one or two twists and twirls before

moving far apart to show a much larger distance. But this is not enough for her restless left hand as her finger does some leaps and bounds whilst still conveying this scientific data. The index fingers come back, together, a waltz now, as the right finger leads, the left pulls itself down, allowing itself to be dragged along by the right. The right finger pulls itself away, as far as the extension of the elbow will allow, the left finger, unfazed points and jabs in emphasis, its moment in the spotlight with the force of a drum solo in a jazz piece. The right scratches the hair, the left finger now exhausted sags, the two hands clasp each other, once again in front of the face.

THE EMBRACE

The left hand caresses the right hand as she stares once more to her left, some romantic vision in the far distance. A deep thought strikes her, something that she needs to ponder, and she sinks back down into her seat, her head lowering into her hands which open up to embrace and cover her face momentarily, pulling them-selves back to reveal her face and cradle her head.

“What is initially most

striking about our subject is just how

expressive her face is.”

24

Opening up her thoughts to her friend, her fingers tweak and play with her ears, fondling the lobes. When she stops speaking, she puts her right hand back in her mouth, bringing with it her friend who leans in very close. The messages between the two are intimate. When next our subject speaks, both hands are brought in front of her mouth, fingers curling down, but still interacting subtly with each other. Her face contin-ues staring longingly into the dis-tance, searching out that elusive vision.

Her friend searches for a way through our subject’s hands, but this embrace is tight, a shield almost. The friend jerks back and forth, darting about but there is no way through, Subject remains motionless and safe in the comfort of her hands. The hands continue their interplay, and motion from the girl is minimal, and this con-tinues for a while. Even the friend has backed away, leaning back in her chair.

THE FALL and THE RESURREC-TION

Suddenly, with a distracted look, her hands drop, leaving her wide open. Her posture picks itself up, but just briefly. Whilst her left hand is below the table, her right reaches up to be chewed at once again. Her head darts forward, now free to more actively engage with her friend, her expression is more open and curious.Once again, as she listens, her eyes open and close to eat up the morsels as she chews away at her hand. There is more of the point-ing. She is desperately looking around. Unable to find what she is seeking, her index finger of the still active right hand moves in front of her mouth in the sign of the “hush”. Things to this point do

not seem to be going so well.

Pulling something out of her sleeve, she moves her hand away from the mouth, palm down, waves it about as she finds the words she needed. Casting this spell, her left hand resurfaces from the depths and is brought up into her waiting right hand, which then clasps itself around the left. Her hands then lock themselves together in front of her attentive face.

THE COMFORTING

She goes back into the dance, a figure indicated to her friend through three fingers in particular. But in the frivolity of the dance her hands reinstate, there is a need to reassure.

Perhaps she, herself, is not sure of the amount she has held out, the dance a seduction to over-come her uncertainty. But she betrays herself as she seeks reassurance from her friend by occasionally breaking the dance to rearrange her hair slightly. Even when she reveals the numbers on her hands, it is in just quick movements, three or four quick flashes before hiding the numeric fingers in her other hand.

The dance can’t sustain itself for long. Her hands go back to hiding her mouth, with one hand be-ing chewed on, the other hover-ing, waiting. Even her joke now is said with a guilty play on her face. Overwhelmed, she covers her face with her hands, pulling her finger tips in enough to let her eyes emerge, her palms almost together in a not-quite prayer.

THE RETURN TO FORM

The uncertain dance begins again. But now it is slower, more de-liberate, more seductive in its

nature. This transforms into a complete conglomeration of her previous actions, less on a loop, but lacking her previous consist-ency, pulled out as and when needed. Her actions are for em-phasis now, instead of expressing, as she had been. Only once is a new movement pulled out, when, using her fingers, she manipu-lates the sides of her mouth into a smile.

THE SUBMISSION

Both hands go back down below the table. She now starts us-ing her face more to carry her expressive manner. Tilted up, her eyes search around with her thoughts, carrying the rest of her head with her. With both hands imprisoned, it is up to her face to release all that is contained within. Even her mouth move-ments become over exaggerated with her inability to wave her expressions in one’s face, as she bites her bottom lip back to juxta-pose her eyes which open in amazement; pouting when she thinks; a vacant slack-jawed stare into space as she absorbs infor-mation, but no longer is she biting it away.

But it is a submissive role. It is her acknowledgement that her

The messages

between the two are intimate.

art elemento

friend has taken control of the conversation. No longer is it a conversation to participate in, it is a conversation to be swept along by. The expression in her face is a mask, a disguise for her, to appear to be participating, when really she is in hiding, waiting for the moment when it is clear and she can reappear once more.

THE SHIELD

The pressure gets so much that she reaches up to rearrange her hair, but rather than seeking ap-proval, this is merely a strategy, the real manoeuvre comes when she picks up her phone. Perhaps she has received a message, perhaps she is just checking the time, but whatever information she gleams from the phone is not as useful as the physical object itself, which she can wave about in her hand, a shield, a weapon, a defence. She holds the phone in front of her, just above the table, fondling it, continually acknowl-edging its presence, if not utilising it. But it has given her strength. Her left hand comes out of hid-ing, and can begin its manoeuvres once again. Our subject is back in the driving seat, even if there is armour underneath that exterior.

But even when I think she is rebuilding her strength, another crux is sought out in the form of the straw protruding from her empty glass, which she grasps and fondles with her thumb.

Could it be that she is hiding something, something that she doesn’t want her arms to betray?

Burying it into the ice? She is direct with her eye contact, in fact this is the most eye contact I have seen since this episode began. As soon as she breaks eye contact, so she loses grip on the straw, her right hand swinging up to her eyes

to rub them, relax them. Was the strain really that much? Relieved, she can begin to go back to her normal state. Her right hand is now resting on the table, the left having dropped the phone, but instead taking up the straw. Yet her left is more active than the right was, manipulating the straw, stirring it in the empty void within the glass.

Vastly different from her right hand, which gripped the straw as if it was supporting her, the left hand is toying with the straw with careless abandon, a variety of dif-ferent grips employed to control the straw.

Her confi dence returned, she abandons the straw to allow her left hand its dance, but this

is momentary, as she has her phone back in her hand. As her friend talks to her, and with the straw back in her hand, she reads the message on the phone. No longer is it a shield, but the main course, her friend’s witterings just the seasoning. But the phone is clearly not satisfactory as she ignores it.

FADE OUT

We leave our subject almost as we fi nd her, chewing at her fi ngers, perhaps with the occasional dance with her right hand. The phone is a permanent but ignored addition in her left hand. But my time here is over. I have spied upon this girl for too long. I should allow her the privacy she keeps behind her mo-bile phone.

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Number 8 is a requirement to show full dedication to one’s club with a visible tattoo. My Club tattoo is on my right arm.

Tattoo Number 9. Tribal half sleeve on the same arm as my club tattoo. I lived as the only white person in a tribal village in Senegal, West Af-rica for about 2 years. While there, I would often receive henna tattoos from village women for special events such as births, deaths, and wed-dings. I enjoyed this, but it was a long process. Once back in the States, I decided to take a picture of the henna tattoo into a shop and get it slammed into me for life. Unlike many who select trib-al tattoos without personal meaning, my tribal is a real memory for me.

Number 10 is because I am here in Korea, a country that I truly love: I decided that since I want to stay here for a long time, I should have a Korean tattoo artist do some work. I wanted a Ko-rean style tattoo with some color. Little did I know that the work I would be getting done would be the start of an eighty-six hour full sleeve. My tattoo artist, Han, looked at the tattoos I already had, and drew up a Dragon. The dragon’s role in Korean histo-ry is unique, just as my drag-on tattoo is different. It is not just red or green, but an icy-blue eyed Dragon intermix-ing well with the other two tattoos on my left arm. My parents were right in that tattoos are permanent. This permanence of words, designs,

and symbols tattooed on the body is both a promise and a caution. The promise is that this fixed ink extends the way people can freely ex-press themselves. Tattoos are an ultimate form of self ex-ploration and expression. The caution is that tattoos are everlasting art on one’s body, they are forever. Therefore, most should and do tend to choose what they ink on them-selves carefully instead of ignorantly.

In closing, my tattoos were all chosen carefully to tell part of my story. A stigma still surrounds tattoos, so I am not always looked at fa-vorably, but I don’t care. My tattoo love affair con-tinues. The ink in my body works like a strong, never-ending addiction. It pulls me in and I seek out more tattoos. I do not want to be released from this addic-tion, as my tattoos and their stories remind me of lessons learned and my own strength. For me, each tattoo represents personal growth. I am glad that I had them permanently stamped on me. They are con-stant reminders of the way I live and the way I strive to be the best I can be in eve-rything I that I do.

“ Tattoos are an ultimate form of self ex-ploration and expression. The caution is that tattoos are everlasting art on one’s body, they are forever. Therefore, most should and do tend to choose what they ink on them-selves carefully instead of ignorantly.”

art elemento

POP LIFE

MC BAR BUK-GU

Club MC put on a very good rock and roll show with Harp, the Deserts and Feed the Boats rocking the Rath-skeller-styled un-derground concrete venue, for smoke-filled, beer lubed rockers aged 15 to 60. The bands were good and got bet-ter, as the night went on, each drawing its own crowd, each fill-ing the ears of KPOP-weary western-ers and punk-loving Gwangjuvians alike.

By Doug Stuber

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