Kim Westfall

DMZ: Checkpoint
Real DMZ Project
August 31 - September 23 2023

Participating artists:
Onejoon Che, Soyoung Chung, Gimhongsok, HaeAhn Paul Kwon Kajander, Kyungah Ham, Ikkibawikrrr, Su-Mi Jang, Sunny Kim, Makiko Kudo, Hyeseong Kwon, Jaeseok Lee, Jung-hoon Lee, Woosung Lee, Mikael Levin, Minouk Lim, Moon Kyungwon & Jeon Joonho, Na Mira, Ok Seungcheol, Boma Pak, Hyungjin Park, Noh-wan Park, Seonglib, Youngsun Suh, Sikyung Sung, Kim Westfall, Tomoko Yoneda, Kyung Jin Zoh & Hye Ryeong Cho

The DMZ Exhibition: Checkpoint contemplates on how to perceive the division of Korea and the border area through the perspective of contemporary art and diversify its viewpoint. Continuing various artistic attempts that have dealt with the history and reality of division, it will perceive the DMZ as a new cultural creation zone where reality and imagination intersect.

While acknowledging that the contemplation on war, Korea's division, and the formation of the DMZ as the aftermath begins with an understanding of history and politics, the exhibition will approach the matter with a broader viewpoint and sometimes distance itself while going beyond boundaries. These views may be presented in ambiguous and unfamiliar forms or reveal blurred and layered meanings. We hope that the new artistic attempts will expose the reality and paradoxical situation of the DMZ and transcend our rational thinking and general sensibility.

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Spicy Memory attempts to reconcile the virtual, mutable nature of contemporary Korea with the militarized, static DMZ checkpoint. Ribbons (the artist's chosen material for her textile works), red pepper flakes, and fragments of the artist's adoption documents are encased in an acrylic resin record spinning on a turntable. The stylus never makes contact with the record.

Instead, Vera Lynn's We'll Meet Again and Hank Locklin's Geisha Girl play on loop from an unseen source.

The installation of Spicy Memory in a permanent exhibit of an American GI's bunk meditates on the history of Camp Greaves, and the ongoing US-South Korea alliance, and the contradictions of the DMZ as an ideological space, a nature preserve, and military checkpoint.

My Eyes are Down Here (2015), hangs above the mantelpiece.

Spicy memory, 2023.
Acrylic resin, organza ribbon, adoption documents, red pepper flakes, record player.
30.48 cm / 12 in, Camp Greaves- Documenta 3
DMZ Paju, ROK.

My Eyes are Down Here, 2015.
Tufted acrylic yarn on wooden frame.
78.74 x 58.42 cm / 31 × 23 in, Camp Greaves- Documenta 3
DMZ Paju, ROK.

Spicy Memory, 2024.
video, Camp Greaves- Documenta 3
DMZ Paju, ROK.