Beginning in 2017, the MMCA (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea) expanded its performance art program in order to herald the latest trends in contemporary art that challenge the boundaries of genre and support artists of the performances in Asia. As part of this program, MMCA has mounted at least one performance piece each month since March 2018, with Kim Seonghee (formerly the inaugural artistic director of the Asia Culture Center-Theater and professor at Kaywon University of Art & Design) as project supervisor. This year's Asia Focus, held for the second time after the first in 2017, will feature new works by Nam Hwayeon, Ho Tzu Nyen, Meiro Koizumi, Dai Chenlian and Royce Ng, five of Asia's foremost artists .
In Asia, where there is no performance art infrastructure, the Asia Focus platform offers artists the opportunity to produce new works in Asia and present them to the world. By directly commissioning artists to produce works, the MMCA proactively discovers and supports Asian artists.
The MMCA has adopted a co-production system in order to efficiently finance performance works by sharing production expenses and to effectively present le works al public international. Deep Present, produced by Kim Jisun through Asia Focus 2017, was co-financed by three art institutes in Belgium, the Netherlands and Austria, and the piece successfully completed its performance tour at each institution in May. The five works presented by Asia Focus this year were also co-produced by a total of 10 international organizations including Abu Dhabi Art of the UAE, Ming Contemporary Art Museum of China, Singapore International Festival of Arts, the Kampnagel Theater in Germany and Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Belgium with a performance tour planned for each organization after the premiere at the MMCA.
World-renowned performing arts magazine I/O Gazette rated the MMCA's Asia Focus 2017 as “an ideal place for any global programmer to introduce performances that will long influence audiences' perspective on the world. ” As MMCA Seoul is fast becoming an international hub through which art professionals experience the latest Asian works, a leading art platform focused on the production and distribution of Asian performance art. As four of the five works featured in this year's program (works by Nam Hwayeon, Royce Ng, Meiro Koizumi and Dai Chenlian) make their first-ever debuts, experts from around the world, including Creative Director Stephen Armstrong of Arts Center Melbourne, Australia, and curator Soma Chiaki of the Aichi Triennale, Japan, will visit the MMCA to see the works in person and consider inviting exhibitions.
This year's Asia Focus will speak for diverse Asian populations through works by Ho Tzu Nyen (Singapore), Royce Ng (Hong Kong), Meiro Koizumi (Japan), Nam Hwayeon (Korea) and Dai Chenlian (China).
Ho Tzu Nyen's The Mysterious Lai Teck and Royce Ng's Queen Zomia reflect on today's Asia by referencing modern and contemporary history. Ho Tzu Nyen's media-acclaimed play and stage play The Mysterious Lai Teck premiered at Theater Kampnagel in August and will be performed for the second time as part of MMCA Performing Arts: Asia Focus 2018. This piece focusing on the man known as Lai Teck, a leader of the Malayan Communist Party from 1939 to 1947 who turned out to be a triple agent for French, British and Japanese intelligence services, highlights the decolonization and modernization processes of the Southeast Asia that brought about changes in people's sense of national identity. Continuing from Ghost of Showa, the first installment of Royce Ng's Opium Museum trilogy premiered as part of MMCA Performing Arts: Asia Focus 2017, the second installment, Queen Zomia, will also premiere through MMCA Performing Arts 2018: Asia Focus. Queen Zomia summons Olive Yang—the leader of XNUMXth-century anarchist provinces in Southeast Asia who was also an opium warlord—into a pyramid hologram to unravel the complex history of Southeast Asia within which national and ethnic identities became intertwined.
Japan's representative video artist Meiro Koizumi unveils Sacrifice, his first virtual reality work. Using VR technology, the artist vividly captures the story of a man who lived through the war in Iraq, testing the extent to which an audience can sympathize with another person's pain and suffering. Cross Genre Artist Nam Hwayeon's Orbital Studies explores the motion of Halley's Comet, attempting to perceive the comet's revolution around the sun at any given moment. This work, which deals with the human desire to understand the mysterious, will be presented in Gallery 6 of MMCA Seoul, which has a unique architectural structure. Dai Chenlian, a Chinese show to be premiered in Korea, also has a clear view of Asia. Through an analog puppet theater, Big Nothing tells a ghost story originating in the Tang Dynasty known as “Youyang Zazu”. Throughout the story, the artist attempts to disintegrate the line between the logical and the illogical, the sensible and the senseless, and the meaningful and insignificant.
For more information, visit the MMCA website (www.mmca.go.kr).
