I thought about the conditions of ‘speaking’ and ‘being heard’—who can narrate the main narratives within the art world, and which voices are always relegated to footnotes. This research was deeply intertwined with concepts such as ‘identity performance,’ ‘self-objectification,’ and ‘the burden of representation.’ However, these concepts were not abstract but also everyday experiences: being invited for the ‘perspective’ rather than for my work itself, my work being read solely through an ethnic lens, and situations where I had to simplify, explain, or soften complexity to help others understand.
‘Manifesto Volume 1.’ It signifies not an end but a beginning, a draft, a claim to space, and a record of resistance.
Ultimately, this semester's contextual research was not about centring a single theory or outcome, but rather a journey exploring the intersections between the politics of life and public spaces. What does contextualisation mean when the context itself is unstable, controversial, and sometimes imposed from the outside? Perhaps this question has become the core methodology of this semester.
I will attach one of the essays I wrote for this course this semester on this page.
Why do I make art?
When I was in high school, my family subscribed to a newspaper. Every morning, we would eat breakfast together and pass the newspaper around to read. On Fridays, there was always a review in the culture section that introduced films worth seeing over the weekend. One day, I noticed a review that was full of praise, without the usual criticisms. I was curious about the film. So I took the subway and traveled over an hour to an art cinema I had never been to before, just to watch that film. It was "In This World" by Michael Winterbottom. On the way home after watching the movie, I couldn't stop thinking about the main characters and the people around them. The film made me think. Not long after, I happened to see Matthew Barney's "Drawing Restraint 9" exhibition at an art museum. The exhibition was different from the art I had known before. There were no beautiful portraits or majestic landscapes. Yet, once again, I thought about the exhibition the entire way home. Art makes me think. Art asks me questions. It makes the familiar seem unfamiliar, makes me look closely at things I had overlooked, and makes me face things I had turned away from. It makes me think. That is why I make art.
I first began studying art in Norway in 2017 at Kunstskolen i Stavanger. I didn't decide to study in Norway because I had any specific expectations or goals. I was drawn to the unique atmosphere of Scandinavian films I encountered at a Nordic film festival in Seoul. Having grown up with the intense, energetic and emotionally charged narratives of Korean films and dramas, I was struck by how, by comparison, almost nothing seemed to happen in the Scandinavian films. And somehow, that intrigued me. I thought, If I went to a country where almost nothing happens, wouldn't I want to do something? At the time, I submitted my application using Google Translate. I couldn't speak Norwegian or English. during my first semester, I couldn't communicate properly with anyone in English, Norwegian, or Korean. But eventually, I became close friends with Marie, Frida, Leif Ole, and Jon. They didn't need to explain themselves to me. I could understand them through their work. I didn't need to explain myself to them either. They came to know me through my work. That's how we became friends. Art speaks for itself. Art has its own language. You don't need to attend a language school to learn that language. Art transcends language and borders; it communicates through the artwork itself. That is why I make art. To communicate with people. I make art because I want to tell them who I am, because I want to know who they are, and because I want to connect with them. I make art to express myself.
I have worn glasses since I was very young, probably since I was six years old. I have both high astigmatism and severe nearsightedness, so I always had to get custom-made lens for glasses. It was a very strange experience. Without glasses, a single traffic light looked like more than ten overlapping blobs of color. The world without glasses was a blurry landscape with no dots, lines, or surfaces. But with glasses, I saw a clear world where dots, lines, and surfaces connected. As a child, I would sometimes take off my glasses and ask my mother, “Are you here now? Do you see what I see?” I was always scared. What if I was the only one who could see this? What if one day everyone disappeared, and I was left alone in this blurry world? Perhaps that's why I was obsessed with apocalyptic themes as a child, and sometimes in my dreams, I would find myself alone in strange, unfamiliar places, scared and sad, crying until I woke up. That's why I make art. To confirm that I am not alone here. To know that what I see is also seen by others. Or to keep bringing other people into the world that only I can see, so that I am not left alone there. And because I am curious about the world that others see. I am curious about the world I've never seen, things I've never been able to explain, shown clearly by others through their own way of seeing. and I want to visit that world, so I make art.
In 2023, when I applied for an MFA after completing my bachelor's degree in Bergen, the Norwegian government introduced a tuition fee system for non-EU citizens for the first time. Art was included in Category A, which had the highest tuition fees, along with medicine and dentistry. Fortunately, I was able to waive the tuition fees because I had studied for my bachelor's in Norway. However, while reading various articles at the time, I came across a comment that said, “Why should we use our taxes to educate foreigners?” This comment stuck with me deeply. During my bachelor's degree, I benefited from free education funded by public taxes. At the time, I had no idea how much an art education actually cost. But after the introduction of the tuition fee system, I came to realize just how significant a financial investment arts education requires. That made me wonder: Did I truly deserve that level of investment as a student? Was the art I make meaningful enough to warrant such public support? And after all that, could the art I make actually contribute to society in any meaningful way?
Artworks cannot vote, cure diseases, stop wars, prevent climate change, or slow down technological progress. So what can art do? Why should art be made and why do people need it? That is why I make art. I believe that art without an audience is merely a hobby. When people come to see an artwork, it comes to life. The life of an artwork begins the moment the audience leaves the exhibition space. Artists observe the world through a stranger's eyes, pose questions to people, and make them think. Sometimes, even when they know there are no answers, they demand that we continue to ask questions without giving up. While an artwork itself may lack power, it is possible for those who come to see art to see, feel, and recognize things through art. This influence may not be direct, but it seeps into the flow of people's lives and spreads little by little. Art has that power. There is a world that can only be seen through art. And from that moment on, the world you see will no longer be the same as before. That is what art does best. That is why I make art.
I have disliked studying since I was a child, and even now, I am not fluent in English. During my master's, I struggled to understand what my professors and classmates were saying in the contextualization theory class. I tried to avoid those classes as much as possible, and I never fully understood what the reflection notes we had to submit at the end of each semester were supposed to be. Now that I think about it, the word “reflection” is frequently used in art. Art mirrors the world—it reflects, imitates, distorts, and sometimes even shatters it. It responds to reality and returns it in an altered, often unsettling form. A mirror reflects reality as it is, but the image inside is always reversed. Art is the same. It is the same, yet unfamiliar; accurate, yet distorted. Within it, we are forced to reexamine the world we thought we knew. That is why I make art. I hope that what I see will be reflected in others. And I hope that before that mirror, each person will ask their own questions.