Starting in 2011 (positioned in-between the art and design biennales, respectively), the Gwangju Folly Project realized ten buildings as a means of revitalization for the city’s center. Involving a variety of practitioners including artists, architects, and writers, whose work is focused around an interdisciplinary and collaborative approach to design, the realized follies activate the space and create discourse through the object itself as well as through the experience produced by its inhabitants.
Ai Weiwei, Eyal Weizman, Superflex, Seokhong Go, Mihee Kim, Do Ho Suh,Raqs Media Collective and the architects who are part of the list of participants such as David Adjaye and Rem Koolhaas are teaming up with writers. David Adjaye will be collaborating with Rom-based Taiye Selasi and Rem Koolhaas will collaborate with New York and Berlin-based writer Ingo Niermann.
Nikolaus Hirsch (director), Philipp Misselwitz and Eui Young Chun (curators) have developed a curatorial approach for Gwangju Folly II, which uses the ambiguities of a Folly as a tool of inquiry to address the expectations of public space. The transformative potential of public space has been etched into public consciousness ever since the ten-day pro-democracy uprising in May 1980, which took place in the streets and squares of Gwangju. Revisiting some of these historic sites, a series of newly commissioned Follies seek to test the constitution and potential of public space today in contemporary Gwangju as well as in the global political arena.
The curatorial approach describes a folly as a critical object that oscillates between aesthetic autonomy and social-political potential. Situated in a field between a decontextualized status and contextualized condition the Gwangju Folly projects aim to readdress the contested question of public space.
Folly sites
The spatial strategy for selecting Folly sites is based on an investigation into the spatial-political order of contemporary Gwangju. This urban research will produce an inventory of sites in which political power in Gwangju is constituted and manifested, ranging from formal institutions such as the town hall or district government offices, serving the citizens of Gwangju on a daily basis, to police station, or civil society institution. The urban research will be conducted in cooperation with Gwangju universities as well as the local citizens.The resulting spatial archive will serve as a basis for the definition of Folly sites.
Follies
The invited teams will be asked to interpret the ambivalent dual function inherent in the typology of architectural follies - between contextualization and decontextualization, between serving everyday needs of citizens yet also questioning complacency by provoking political discourse and possibly action.
Rem Koolhaas and Ingo Niermann pay their attention to 'voting,' a new type of demonstration that takes place on an ongoing basis, as a way of expressing individual thoughts in public spaces. This work is a polling station with a camera that automatically recognizes people who go though a passage of their choice among the three choices of "Yes", "No" or "None of the above" on a banner in the shape of a streetlight located on the road next to Gwangju Student Independence Movement Memorial Hall. This work will encourage people to form a public opinion naturally.
