The works and projects participating in Mediacity Seoul 2016 allude, or relay suggestions to the following questions: how to formulate individual and common expectations out of unsought-for inheritances, be it war, disaster, poverty or displacement; how to generate as many versions of futures as possible and imagine plots of radical discontinuity, within the context of South Korea that is marooned in a peninsula-cum-island; and finally, how to enable time-slip into these futures through the language of art and the capabilities of media.

The title, NERIRI KIRURU HARARA, is derived from a line of the poem “Two Billion Light Years of Solitude” written by Japanese poet Shuntaro Tanikawa, which verbalizes the imaginary language of Martians. With this title, Mediacity Seoul 2016 sets out an effort to gesture the uncharted languages of the future, or even, of the lost past and present.

The biennale will invite approximately 50 artists of which the initial 29 are announced on this occasion. The full artist list will follow in late June.

Preliminary list of artists

Basel Abbas & Ruanne Abou-Rahme (Palestine/USA), Jonathas de Andrade (Brazil), Bik Van der Pol (Netherlands), Jeamin Cha (Korea), Taeyoon Choi (Korea/USA), Venzha Christ (Indonesia), Ahmad Ghossein (Lebanon), Yang Ah Ham (Korea/Netherlands), Sara Hendren (USA), Hong Seung-Hye (Korea), Pierre Huyghe (France/USA), João Maria Gumão & Pedro Paiva (Portugal), Sylbee Kim (Germany/Korea), Christine Sun Kim (USA), Kim Heecheon (Korea), Joohyun Kim (Korea), Oliver Laric (Austria/Germany), Mire Lee (Korea), Tiago Mata Machado (Brazil), Nicholas Mangan (Australia), Cinthia Marcelle (Brazil), Ursula Mayer (Austria/UK), Zanele Muholi (South Africa), Eduardo Navarro (Argentina), Natacha Nisic (France), Carolee Schneemann (USA), A.L. Steiner (USA), Akihiko Taniguchi (Japan), Zhou Tao (China)

Four publications and two summer camps act as assistive and amplifying devices to the exhibition. Titled CouldBe, the pre-biennial publication series of Mediacity Seoul 2016 presents four independent issues between March and August, each devised from different perspectives of the invited editors. Yang Ah Ham’s summer camp The Village houses a temporary community of art educators, in a bid to explore alternative approaches to creative learning. Taeyoon Choi organizes Uncertainty School which focuses on unlearning the idea of disability and on embracing uncertainty and difference.

Artistic Director / Curator

Beck Jee-sook was Artistic Director of the 4th Anyang Public Art Project (APAP) Public Story, held from 2013 to 2014. Previously, she was Artistic Director of Atelier Hermès (2011-2014), Director of the Arts Council Korea (ARKO) Art Center and Project Director of Insa Art Space (2005-2008).