This project is an ongoing work to portray Korean female artists who are Pro-protest bodies. They are forward social change and betterment by creating subjective narratives of women, and personally speaking up for women's rights. By their personal works and words, they create social discourses that are also universal to other Korean young women.
I attempt to support and participate in the solidarity by transferring their messages into a graphic form.
On 18-9 September 2017, I participated in the PaTi workshop <Bodies of Discourse> supervised by Anja Kaiser for International Typography Biennale <Typojanchi> in Seoul. It was a procedure to represent multifaceted interpretations on chosen personas. I then chose Lang Lee as one, but could not complete the project.
I decided to expand and complete this project with the aim to visualize the solidarity of Korean women by portraying contemporary Korean music artists who:
1. are women;
2. deliver clear feminist messages through their works of art;
3. empower other women by doing so.
2. deliver clear feminist messages through their works of art;
3. empower other women by doing so.
This ongoing series of posters are based on a typographic template in order to visualize the solidarity by giving the impression of a continual tape when linked vertically.
Every guideline from the workshop is also applied in the series, including the single-tone rule.
LANG LEE is a singer-songwriter, illustrator, and filmmaker. She is ceaseless in effort to 'speak better', and to 'speak in confidence'.
How do you define living in South Korea?
Do you sometimes feel as if drifting on a desert?
Do you sometimes feel as if drifting on a desert?
한국에서 태어나 산다는 데 어떤 의미를 두고 계시나요
때로는 사막에 내던져진 것 같은 그런 느낌이 드시나요
때로는 사막에 내던져진 것 같은 그런 느낌이 드시나요
Playing God — Lang Lee
신의 놀이 — 이랑
Korean women, just like the lyrics of her song 'Playing God', are portrayed in this poster as camels, lined up and walking through the desert.
I aspire to make choices on my own behalf.
We need more language.
…
This is just a beginning.
나는 스스로 선택하고 싶다.
우리에게는 더 많은 언어가 필요하다.
…
이제부터가 시작이다.
— Lang Lee 이랑 (https://twitter.com/2lang2/status/972828114769211392)
South Korea has always been an island of rape culture based upon its solid patriarchy and vertical hierarchy. Women’s voices were only without language, not delivered, or not listened to. This is why #MeToo confessions here are a practice, solidarity, and appeal.
“I speak, you listen. We speak, now listen.” This is why the chants at International Women's Day 2018 marches in Seoul were an appeal.
Now listen to the voices of women in Korea. This is just a beginning.
They call me a beauty. They call me a princess. I might be a killer, agitator.
Taipei — 75A
75A is an electronic music duo of Oyo and Graye, named after the bra size of Oyo. Their album was released as a book of photographs by Uiryeong Park of 75 Korean women wearing their bras.
Women are educated to hide bras, even their straps, which are used to hide their breasts.
This project conveys the unpleasing experiences of hiding what is hiding the breasts, and the mood of being women admist misaligned gazes.
가슴을 가리기 위한 도구를 또 가려야하는 불편함, 어긋난 시선 속에서 지내는 여성들의 기분, 그 일부분이 조금이나마 담겨 있습니다.
— Uiryeong Park 박의령 (https://tumblbug.com/75a)
Brassieres are one of the most basic methods to assess women and their bodies, and to both physically and mentally oppress women. This poster is also to raise awareness that 97.7% of Korean adult women wear bras, but but even to talk about them is silenced. One of my own bras is photographed and composed as the main object of this poster to support 75A's project.
Solitude is not recognizable. Let us hit the road before bleaker.
고독을 인정받을 수는 없다. 길을 나서자, 더 어두워지기 전에.
Snow — Sawol Kim
아주 추운 곳에 가서야만 쉴 수 있는 사람 — 김사월
SAWOL KIM is a singer-songwriter. She writes performs songs that illustrate her life as a young Korean woman.
According to the artist, Susan, the title of her first album, is a persona through which she delivers universality of her stories.
늦은 밤 나는 컴퓨터로
춤추는 여자 아이돌을 봐
모든 사람들은 꽃 피는 여자를
다 갖고싶다 하지만
나는 그 누구도 믿을 수가 없어
Young Girl — Sawol Kim
젊은 여자 — 김사월
Susan, the name meaning lily, is illustrated in this poster as a reflection in two facing mirrors, to portray her music and also to show how women, or female K-POP artists as in her song 'Young Girl', are objectified.
