Busan Biennale 2016: Hybridizing Earth, Discussing Multitude

The Busan Biennale Organizing Committee will hold the Busan Biennale 2016 at the Busan Museum of Art and the F1963 (KISWIRE Suyeong factory) from September 3 to November 30, 2016 under the theme Hybridizing Earth, Discussing Multitude. This year’s biennale will be curated by Yun Cheagap (Director of the HOW Art Museum in China) and will consist of two exhibitions (Project 1, Project 2) and multifarious programs (Project 3). The exhibitions are divided into two parts: Project 1 featuring Chinese, Japanese and Korean avant-garde art before the 1990s and Project 2 featuring the global biennale system that emerged after the 1990s. 

Click here for more information about the Artistic Director & Curators.

Project 1: an/other avant-garde china-japan-korea 
Project 1 to be held at the Busan Museum of Art is an exhibition that will shed light on Chinese, Japanese and Korean experimental avant-garde art that spontaneously came into being in each country in the 1960s to 1980s. Co-curated by Chinese (Guo Xiaoyan), Japanese (J-Team; Noi Sawaragi, Akira Tatehata, Yuzo Ueda) and Korean (Kim Chandong) curators, this project features 137 artworks submitted by 64 artists or teams from three countries. The Chinese section will address the period of resistance and conflict spanning from 1976 to 1995 when the Cultural Revolution, the Beijing Spring, and the Tianmen Square Massacre took place whereas the Japanese section will feature avant-garde art from the period of the bombing of Hiroshima to the end of the 1980s, the Gutai Group, Mono-ha, and part of Superflat. The Korean section will address the sphere of Korean experimental art, which was the part of conceptual art, happening, media, overshadowed by Dansaekhwa (monochrome painting in Korea) and Minjung Misul (People’s Art) in the 1960s to 1980s. 

Click here for a list of participating artists (Project 1).

Project 2: Hybridizing Earth, Discussing Multitude
Project 2 curated by Artistic Director Yun Cheagap is a thematic exhibition to be held under the title Hybridizing Earth, Discussing Multitude. This project will be an exhibition that reexamines the biennale system that came into being around the world in the 1990s and will present the role and nature of biennales where new discourses on contemporary art are raised by multiple intelligences. The F1963 (KISWIRE Suyeong factory) will be filled with experimental works by 56 artists or teams from 23 countries, turning it into a ground for the public sphere of multitude and a new space for culture and art.

Click here for a list of participating artists (Project 2).

Project 3: A Ground for Discussing Multitude, Moving Beyond Genres 
Project 3 features a multitude of programs including academic and educational programs to bring light to the exhibition theme. In this event in particular, a ground for discussing multitude will be created through the involvement of scholars working not only in the field of art but other genres as well. With this opportunity they will discuss a broader range of culture and art.

“The Busan Biennale 2016 will be an underlying question concerning ‘biennale’ as a form of exhibition, as well as a reflection on and criticism of the existence of artists,” stated Artistic Director Yun.

The progress in and process of preparing the Busan Biennale 2016 will be consistently posted on the Busan Biennale official website.

Further information is available upon request.

PR team
juhwa.moon@busanbiennale.org