DMZ: Territories of Assembly

2014
Genève
Artsonje Center
Type: Research

Artsonje Center (Seoul) & Live In Your Head (Geneva)

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Seoul Geneva

Credits
  • Research directed and curated by Prof. Markus Miessen
  • Project Team: Karim Bel Kacem, Denise Bertschi, Tali Serruya, Ciel Grommen, Carol Lee, Yeji Lee, and Seyoung Yoon.

Derived from individual and group observations of and around the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), Territories of Assembly investigates and interrogates some of the pressing issues around the marginal yet geopolitical sandwich territory that is known the DMZ. Subjects such as Division, Seclusion and Exception are at stake here and – in regard to a range of borders that have been brought about due to friction and conflict created through historical, political, economic, and social variables – are thereby mobilizing the significance of (in)visible borderlines and the subsequent phenomena that they inevitably cause.

The work of the Geneva-based, multi-national research team has been developed across formats in a post-disciplinary manner, speculating on the potential for outside commentary and speculations as a means of critical reflection as well as prospective techniques unearthing the various connections between past, present and future. The exhibition investigates the spatial as well as socio-political realities and frictions of and around both the physical and psychological geography of the DMZ. As a joint effort and collaboration between Artsonje Center (Seoul) and the Haute École d’Art et de Design (Geneva), the project contributes to an ongoing discussion between a group of international artists and intellectuals.

Based on a methodology of agonistic practice of observation that culminates in a series of individual as well as group “products”, these multiple interventions form the basis of a series of investigations that aim to open up a new terrain that addresses the long-term societal trajectories of the latent North/South conflict.