Spaceの July 2018 の目次

What is ‘good form’? This simple question seems to have been the subject of at least one struggle posed by today’s architecture and design fields. In the case of architecture, according to the functionalist aesthetics represented by the phrase, ‘the form follows the function’, later generations have performed their own work following, rejecting, or sometimes modulating this approach. The exhibition, ‘100 Years German Werkbund 1907 – 2007’, held at the Sungkok Art Museum, is the 100th anniversary display celebrating the establishment of the ‘German Werkbund’, a movement that contemplated a ‘good form’ with rigour and intensity. This touring exhibition, which has already been shown in various countries, was jointly organised by the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and the Architekturmuseum at the Technische Universitat in Munich. Germany Werkbund was established when the…

Images of pale, bleeding zombies have been inserted between glass panels and stand like signs throughout the gallery carpeted with red. Horrible shrieks and laughter blend with the red of the floor, filling the room, making the exhibition hall bizarre and frightening. ‘Beyond the Land of Minimal Possessions,’ the solo exhibition of Lili Reynaud-Dewar at Atelier Hermés, is an exhibition of 80-minute video and image panels exploring the theme. What was it that the artist wanted to convey by generously reappraising the cliches of the horror movie, such as a series of a mysterious cases that happen one after another? The artist combines documentary and zombie fiction in the background of a real city called Marfa in Texas, USA, and points out that to art world there is no alternative…

Tai Soo Kim (principal, TSKP Architects) is the first architect to study in the United States after graduating from university in Korea and chose to remain there as an architect. The Tai Soo Kim Architectural Travelling Fellowship (T. S Kim Fellowship) was set up by Kim to contribute to the Korean architectural world, an architect who has established his own ground and brought international acclaim to Korean architecture. The fellowship is celebrating its 27th anniversary this year. Choi Jaeseok (pricipal, OA) is this year’s winner. It is worth noting that the Fellowship embarked upon a partnership with the Mokchon Kim Jung Sik Foundation this year to create a sustainable and steady operation. SPACE interviewed Tai Soo Kim to hear about the winner of this year and the Fellowship. Park Seml…

‘Freespace describes a generosity of spirit and a sense of humanity at the core of architecture’s agenda, focusing on the quality of space itself’, write Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara, architects and curators of the 2018 Venice Biennale of Architecture, in their manifesto. It should not be surprising that the ideas of ‘generosity’ and ‘humanity’ anchor the otherwise loosely defined theme of this year’s exhibition: ‘freespace’. From the earliest considerations of generosity in the Western philosophical tradition, freedom and humanity have become its natural counterparts. What is new in the inflection of these curators is the insertion of ‘space’, and of course architecture, into this conceptual trio. How might this customary triangulation of concepts apply to ‘the quality of space’ the curators inquire – and, in a more contextualized sense,…

Previously, tourists at Gapado had to adjust the duration of their tour according to the ferry schedule. It was because there was no proper facility for resting and waiting. The Snack Bar was built with this in mind. It is a place where one can enjoy light snacks while enjoying the view of the sea. At the back of the Snack Bar, there is an archive room that holds a record of the history of Gapado.…

Previously, there was no decent place for town residents to gather. The village Hall in the island’s centre was built by repurposing the unused Nonghyeop warehouse into a multipurpose space to aid in the local communal and production activities.…

Archltect: Archihood WXY (Kang Woohyun, Kang Youngjin) Locatlon: 282 Samgong-ri, Seolcheon-myeon, Muju-gun, Jeollabuk-do, Republic of Korea Programme: pension, house Slte area: 2,275m2 Bulldlng area: 583.08m2 Gross floor area: 583.08m2 Bulldlng scope: 1F Helght: 4.45m Parklng: 8 Bulldlng to land ratlo: 25.63% Floor area ratlo: 25.63% Structure: reinforced concrete Exterlor finlshlng: exposed concrete, wooden louver Interlor finlshlng: paint on gypsum board, hardener on plane concrete Structural englneer: S.D.M structural consulting engineers Mechanlcal and electrlcal englneer: Seonhwa Constructlon: ES construction, Deck & Floor (Kim Dongsoo) Landscape deslgn: Anmadang the lab Deslgn perlod: Apr. 2016 – Apr. 2017 Constructlon perlod: Apr. 2017 – Feb. 2018 Cllent: Choi Seyoung Archlhood WXY is located in Seoul, Korea, and was founded in 2013 by two young, creative architects, Kang Woohyun and Kang Youngjin. The company name…

The 4th Industrial Revolution was the buzzword of recent times. The anticipated rapid rate of change, such as the development of artificial intelligence that will surpass human intellect, the advancement of technology, and the advent of a hyper-connected society, all entails not only optimism but also apprehension and concern for an ambiguous future. This is very similar to the utopian expectations and dystopian concerns back in the 1960s, which witnessed the rapid technological advancement that led to modern warfare and weaponry, mankind’s landing on the moon, and the commercialization of television. The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) has crafted an exhibition that highlights these pioneering activities, to contemplate the social role of art and convergence of art and science technology fostered by E.A.T. (Experiments in Art and…

The ‘Against Architecture’ exhibition, part of Seoul Museum of Art’s (SeMA) Space Support Project, is will be open at SeMA Storage from June 8 – 24. Sim Somi (independent curator), who has dealt with the structural problems faced by society through architecture and cities as subject matter in works such as ‘Micro City Lab’ (2016) and ‘Collapse’ (2016), here addresses urban regeneration and the relationships between the city and its people. The exhibition does not treat architecture in a city simply as physical spaces or matter, but rather as a medium that casts questions over the relation to social structure and as metaphors of new possibilities. On Confession of the Desire to Halt in the Air × the Beautiful High-Rise Buildings of Death, Zung Woon attached fluorescent lights that represent…

As a city develops, it is difficult to secure green areas. How can we experience nature in a metropolis that is almost full? ‘Vertical Garden’ refers to a garden designed to allow plants to grow on a vertical wall. The Vertical Garden that warmly embraces buildings is meaningful in that it nests nature within an artificial environment. On June 15, the Embassy of France in Korea, Institut Culturel Français, The Daesan Foundation, the Kyobo Book Centre, and Kyobo Life Insurance co-hosted the Kyobo Humanities Lecture where botanist Patrick Blanc, who visited Korea for the opening of the Museum of Contemporary Art Busan (MoCA Busan), was invited as a lecturer and to participate in a discussion titled ‘Reintroducing Nature in Urban Space: Utopia or Reality?’. The creator of ‘Vertical Garden’, Patrick…

FREESPACE The 2018 Venlce Blennale ls the 16th lnternatlonal archltecture exhlbltlon. Held from 26 May to 25 November, thls exhlbltlon ls malnly taklng place ln Arsenale and Glardlnl. The chlef curators of thls Blennale, Yvonne Farrell and Shelly McNamara, have announced the central theme ‘Freespace’ wlth the explanatlon ‘a generoslty of splrlt and a sense of humanlty at the core of archltecture’s agenda’. 71 archltects and 63 natlonal pavlllons have presented thelr lnterpretatlons. Swlss, the wlnner of the Golden Llon, deslgned an exhlbltlon entltled ‘Svlzzera 240: House Tour’ that offers a physlcal experlence of the scale varlatlon throughout the lnterlor of the apartment. The reclplent of the Honorable Mentlon, the Brltlsh Pavlllon entltled ‘Island’, completely emptled lts lnterlor, whllst offerlng the audlence the opportunlty to cllmb up to lts rooftop…

Things that Arrive and Depart from the Wave-Stricken Island Setting sail from port Unjin in Jeju Moseulpo at 9am, the ferry soon arrived at the northern landing site of Gapado island (Gapado). The journey took about 15 minutes. Visible to the naked eye from the port on a clear day, Gapado and Jeju island are located close to one another. As the ferry door opened, tourists wearing colourful hiking clothes alighted from the ship. With this gentle and calm landscape in the background, the gable-roofed multi-storey houses that resemble weekend getaways greet their guests at the entrance of the island. The tourists took photos of the newly-built terminal structure and the Gapado sculpture before beginning their journey. Gapado, which resembles a stingray in its shape, is an island of about…

From the perspective of revitalization, the design intention set out for the Gapado House was to restore the landscape by means of preserving the spatial organisation of the town. Numerous empty houses around Gapado were used in this project, and the horizontal town landscape of Gapado was left undisturbed by maintaining the original size and height of the buildings. Gapado House is composed of six building blocks from A to F. From the beginning of the project most of the empty houses were found to be unrecoverable, discovered at the early minimal dismantling stage. However, for the buildings A, B, D, and E the original composition could be kept intact, as it was possible to preserve their wall structures. Windows were installed at suitable places to allow the interior space…

As a programme that provides a workspace and services to artists, the artist-in-residence facility was installed to help create a better future for Gapado by means of introducing cultural activities. This in turn would provide a site of record and documentation of the town’s developing history. An abandoned condominium at the southeastern end of Gapado, which had construction halted midway through the project in the mid 1990s due to bankruptcy, still stands with just its underground skeletal structures intact. This structure, which was also left partly submerged underwater for more than 20 years, became a hotbed for frightening tales in the town. The 500-pyeong sized basement space, built 20 years ago, was suitable in all aspects. It once seemed almost impossible to create a space that would provide not only…

A photograph of a man in the shower. A strange feeling of watching a private life arrests the eyes on the picture, which shows a man’s naked body slightly disguising his intimate parts. However, the feeling was not invasive, as if I was peeping at him. Perhaps it is because the figure in the photograph seems to be very natural, as if he was nonchalantly continuing his normal daily routine. This was the first impression taken away from Kim Mihyun’s new Bathroom series, which has an intensity but also a modest comfort. I wondered what other scenes might feature in the works of Kim. Klm Geumyoung (Klm): It seems that thls you haven’t held solo exhlbltlon ln Korea for a long tlme? Kim Mihyun (Kim): Indeed. I have had exhibitions…

After the Second World War, mankind faced social pressures that were fundamentally different from those that had come before. Problems, like war-induced mass destruction, explosive population growth and extensive reach of urban slums, had become severe, complex and widespread. Each country’s reaction to them was radical and bold. Consequently, a desperate problem brought about by severe housing shortages could be virtually resolved, but at the cost of humanity. However, ironically, this era produced a lot of new housing types and models that have dramatically changed the ways we perceive the human living environment. These housing models, reflecting new ideologies at the heart of their design, were not credited as housing models at first, but soon they started to exert a profound influence and have since become a solid model and…

Bucheon Creativity Remix-Culture Playground B39 (B39), which has been rebuilt as a multi-cultural facility in the old Samjeong-dong trash incineration plant in place of an unsightly local facility, presented its first exhibition on June 1, ‘Light Matters’ by French artist Guillaume Marmin. Guillaume Marman is a French visual artist who has worked with various senses by linking elements of various genres, from music to the performing arts. The exhibition consists of two works: Licht, mehr Licht! and Timée. When visitors open the closed door of the exhibition hall and enter, it is dark as Erebus. Spectators who hesitate over entering are prompted and even aided by the staff. Walking through the inner tent of Licht, mehr Licht!, dozens of lights intersect the darkness, just like security laser sensors in a…

The Korean peninsula is ushering in a new diplomatic era, with improved inter-Korean and DPRK-U.S. relations. Expectations have been heightened over what might happen, things that were unimaginable in the recent past for charged political reasons, and accordingly, various areas of society are making an active effort towards resuming the once cut off inter-Korean exchange. How does the architecture world feature in these developments? Although architecture is to be included in various cooperative economic projects, there has been only minimal exchange thus far between architecture communities. Recently, some architecture organisations in South Korea have formed inter-exchange committees and holded seminars in preparation for the recent turn of events. We met with the people involved to hear their thoughts on inter-Korea exchange. Klm Jeoungeun (Klm): The Korean Instltute of Archltects (KIA)…

More than 50 participating countries (65 exhibitions in total), with pavilions on a significant scale dispersed throughout the Arsenale – the former nineteenth-century shipyards – and Giardini (garden) are surrounded by greenery. If the Giardini is composed of independent pavilions that are mostly prepared by first world countries, the Arsenale is a course leading to the main exhibition, passing through other densely separated pavilions and eventually arriving at the Italian and Chinese Pavilions placed in the most secluded area. The Japanese Pavlllon I first stopped by at the Japanese Pavilion on my way to the Korean Pavilion. The overall supervision was by Momoyo Kaijima, the co-founder of Atelier Bow-Wow and a Professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETHZ). Prior to the opening of the exhibition, I…

The first town that one sees when entering Gapado on a ferry from Jeju Moseulpo is Sang-dong. In spite of its beautiful town landscape, multiple buildings around the terminal were in disarray, disrupting the general appearance of the landscape and one’s overall impression upon arrival. The original terminal building was also one of those elements that added this sense of unruliness to the scene. It was decided that this port area should be overhauled, particularly by renovating the original terminal building. The height of the new building was lowered so as to prevent the obstruction of the outlying landscape from view, and its interior were opened up so as to let the surrounding landscape penetrate directly into the building. By opening the structure to the external environment, the surrounding landscape…

What is special about Ha-dong is that the landscape is formed in the combination of Ha-dong port, its fishing boats and the fishing town’s vibrant community. As a town that depends mostly on its fishing industry, the centre of community is the town assembly hall, where the office for fishing industry and town council is located, and the surrounding area around the fishery warehouse. With data analysis from the town’s fishery management system as our starting point, the haenyeo grill house and restaurants were also proposed as spaces for the vibrant town community and tourists to engage with one another. This was undertaken while simultaneously improving the Fishery Center.…

Archltect: Chiasmus Partners (Lee Hyunho) Deslgn team: Park Youngjong, Yang Narae, Lee Sangwha / Interior – Nomura Chika, Huh Yeseul Locatlon: 10 Hakdong-ro 3-gil, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, Korea Programme: office Slte area: 752.4m² Bulldlng area: 367.2m² Gross floor area: 3,083.48m² Bulldlng scope: B2, 8F Helght: 39m Parklng: 23 Bulldlng to land ratlo: 48.81% Floor area ratlo: 248.34% Structure: reinforced concrete Exterlor finlshlng: exposed concrete, glass curtainwall Interlor finlshlng: exposed concrete, painiting Structural englneerlng: Cheil Structure Lab (Park Joohyun) Constructlon: Coremsys, Inc Mechanlcal and electrlcal englneerlng: SeungJin Eng. Inc Deslgn perlod: Dec. 2015 – Jan. 2016 Constructlon perlod: Apr. 2016 – June 2017. Constructlon budget: 4 million USD Cllent: Moon Joonho A Balance between Contradlctory Urban Contexts ITOWER is located a few blocks from Gangnam’s business district, a symbol of modern Seoul…

For the artist Jheon Soocheon, change is the only certainty in life. This is reflected in the protean nature of his work over a career that spans almost thirty years, but also in the way he has lived his nomadic existence — splitting his time between Korea, the United States and Japan. Relatively unknown when he held his first exhibition in Korea in 1989, as he had spent so much time abroad, studying and working in Tokyo and New York City, he became a central figure on the Korean art scene after he won the ‘Menzion d’onore’ for his installation Tou: Motherland in Korea’s inaugural pavilion at the 1996 Venice Biennale. His celebrity was enhanced in 1997 when he was selected as the Artist of the Year by the National…