김진주는 이전 작품 <약속한 시간의 흐름 (동송) As If, They Were Promises (Passage of Proposed Time in Dongsong)>(2015)에서 남북 분단으로 형성된 (비)무장 지대와 관련된 약속을 반추하며 약속의 의미에 관해 묻는다. 한반도 분단 전후부터 2021년 지금까지도 평화를 위한 쌍방의 교류는 ‘약속’이라는 형태로 수행되고 있다. 그 약속 가운데 철도 연결은 지도 위에 미래의 시간을 예시하는 선을 그리지만, 그 선은 지나온 날과 앞으로의 날을 품은 달력 어딘가에 멈춰 서 있다. 신작 <약속한 시간의 선>은 남북 철도 연결 사업의 큰 축인 동해선 제진역 남북출입사무소의 세관검사구역의 장소성, 약속이 도래할 시간을 그려/그어 보는 행위에 꼭 수반되는 사물이자 이미지인 달력, 떠나고 도착하고 다시 떠나며 약속하게 되는 감정, 남북한 사이의 약속에 관한 자료 등을 품은 개별 작품들의 ‘선’으로 구성된다.
먼저 <두 개의 2분의 1>은 남한 달력과 북한 달력에서 숫자 1과 2를 스캔하여 재조합해서 인쇄했다. 남한 달력은 앞날을 상담하는 ‘보살집’에서 만든 것을 활용했다. 북한 달력은 선물로 받은 2012년과 2014년 달력을 활용했다. 북한에서 통용되는 달력은 대부분 국가에서 발행하는 것으로 수량이 제한돼 있기 때문에 귀한 신년 선물이며, 양면으로 인쇄된 것이 특징이다. 이 작품과 <약속한 시간 이미지> 모두 제진역 남북출입사무소의 세관검사구역 대인검색대에 맞춰 제작 및 설치된 작품이며, <두 방향> 역시 제진역 남북출입사무소의 세관검사구역 대물검색대 컨테이너 벨트 위로 남측, 북측 각각의 방향에 하나씩 설치된 2채널 영상이다.
<약속한 시간의 선은 담배와 흙의 냄새에 담긴 소리로 말해진다>는 전작 <약속한 시간의 흐름 (동송)>에서 사운드만을 발췌해서 동해안의 소리와 함께 재편집한 작품이다. 사운드 플레이어가 담긴 찰흙 오브제는 제진역 남북출입사무소 세관검사구역의 대물검색대 안에, 무선 블루투스 헤드폰은 모니터링실 책상에 놓인다. 모니터링실 모니터 화면 크기에 맞춰 제작한 아크릴판 위에는 아카이브 자료 복사물과 비무장 지대의 약속에 관한 질문을 적은 메모가 붙어 있다.
<아직인 약속 - 력(曆)>은 북한 달력을 활용해, 2012년 달력을 2021년으로, 2014년 달력을 2041년 달력으로 재제작한 것이다. 북한 교과과정 소학교 4학년 ‘도화공작’ 교재(통일부 북한자료센터 소장)에는 다 쓴 달력에서 요일과 숫자를 떼서 오랫동안 쓸 수 있는 달력을 만드는 방법이 실려 있다. 작품 옆에 부착된 QR코드를 촬영하면 김진주의 작가 노트가 업로드된 웹페이지로 연결된다. 이 글은 <약속한 시간의 선> 작업에 관한 생각과 한국 전쟁 관련 이미지 아카이브에 관한 작가의 해석을 담고 있다.
Jinjoo Kim’s 2015 work, As If, They Were Promises (Passage of Proposed Time in Dongsong), questions the promises made regarding the “(de)militarized zone” that separates the two Koreas. From the moment of the national division until today, peace agreements between the two Koreas have taken the form of promises. One of these promises states that a railroad will connect the two halves of the country. On the map, a line depicts this railroad that represents a hopeful future, but the line still stands somewhere in time that embraces the past and the future. The individual lines composing Lines of Promising Time highlight the “specific-site” of the customs inspection area at the Inter-Korean Transit Office in Jejin Station. This station is located on the major axis of the East Sea Line, which was conceived as part of the inter-Korean railway project. The work includes a calendar, which provides an image of the anticipated moment when the promise will be fulfilled. The work also evokes the feelings of making promises as people leave, arrive, and leave again. It also references documents related to the promises made between the two Koreas.
The large-scale photo work Two Halves is in Jejin Station and is the same size as the Jejin Station security gate. The numbers 1 and 2 were scanned from the South and North Korean calendars and are placed to signify “1/2.” The numbers scanned from South Korean calendars were published by the “House of Bodhisattva” and the North Korean calendars were gifts from 2012 and 2014. In North Korea, most calendars are state-issued and therefore limited in quantity. For North Koreans, a calendar is a valuable New Year’s gift.
A two-channel montage video, Promising Time Images, shows the artist’s clips of the Jejin railway and the sea, along with selected scenes from the seven-minute promotional video showing the test run of the inter-Korean railway connection project. The test run was produced by the Ministry of Unification, Inter-Korean Economic Cooperation Headquarters on May 17, 2007. To capture the passing moment of unity, the artist edited certain scenes by slowing them down, turning them upside down, and cropping them. Such as images of waving hands inside and outside the train, the train passing the fence line along the shore, and the movement of the waves on the horizon seen from the train window. The new image that intersects these scenes alludes to the line of the promised time and depicts the artist’s memories. The artist lights a North Korean cigarette on the tracks of Jejin Station to commemorate a deceased person, and then crafts a North Korean calendar into a kite flying over the sea on the same tracks (but the kite does not fly).
Another two-channel video, Two Ways, is shown on two monitors. The first monitor features a rewritten text. The piece expands on the twenty questions about the promise between the two Koreas posed in the artist’s previous work, As If, They Were Promises (Passage of Proposed Time in Dongsong). The text moves, resembling an object passing through a security scanner. Contrary to the text, which moves continuously, blinking images are shown in the opposite direction of the first monitor. These blinking images on the second monitor include paintings of the Korean peninsula, birds, maps, and other images portraying the past and present of the historical promises to connect the South and North with a railroad. These two-channel videos are installed on the customs inspection security scanner at the Jejin Station, facing the North and the South.
The Lines of Promising Time Are Told in the Scents of Tobacco and Soil is a narrated work closely related to Two Ways. The artist reads the twenty questions about the promises between the two Koreas presented in the work Two Ways. The recording also includes everyday sounds collected at Jejin Station. The sound comes from the player between clay ashtrays containing cigarette butts once glued to the tracks of Jejin Station and then removed. (The clay ashtray appears on the Jejin Station tracks from the video, Promising Time Images.)
Promise No. 14 of the (De)militarized Zone
On April 27, 2018, there were two names for the Panmunjom Declaration, which promises an end to war and ensures peace for the future. It has been called the Panmunjom Declaration for Peace and Prosperity and the Unification of the Korean Peninsula. With this promise, the South Korean Peninsula and the North Peninsula become one.
Q. Will this promise resonate through a single land?”
Promise No. 17 of the (De)militarized Zone
“When you enter the North Korean region, you must carry your access pass with you at all times; the pass cannot be lent to another person.” Receiving this pass is like making a promise to follow the rules. This promise, written on a card the size of an access pass, hangs around my neck.
Q. On whose neck will the promise be hung, and what is its scale?”
A Calendar—Promises Not Yet Come transforms North Korean calendars from 2012 and 2014 into 2021 and 2041 calendars. During the research process, Kim found instructions in the North Korean fourth grade “Arts and Crafts” textbook (collection of the Ministry of Unification Information Center in North Korea) on how to cut numbers from a used calendar to create a new one.
Promise No. 16 of the (De)militarized Zone
September 15, 2021. I have never met him, and I may or may not be able to go there when that day comes. However, on September 15, 2041, I promised to go to his hometown in the North of the United Korean Peninsula and fly a kite made of calendars as he did before.
Q. Can these promises be kept in the future?”
김진주(b. 1981)는 서울 출생으로 이화여자대학교에서 미술학 전공으로 석사학위를 취득했으며, 현재 미술작가, 전시기획자, 연구자 등 시각예술 분야에서 다양한 역할을 맡으며 활동하고 있다. 문자, 영상, 사진, 아카이브, 설치, 퍼포먼스, 공공 미술 등 다양한 매체와 형식을 활용하며, 듣기와 말하기(대화)를 방법론으로 삼아 언어의 부서지고 남겨진 이미지, 언어의 수행성과 양극성의 공존을 탐구하는 개념적이고 사회적인 작업을 한다. 개인전으로는 《지진계들》(합정지구, 서울, 2020)을 선보였고, 단체전으로 《Home Works Forum 7》(Ashkal Alwan, 베이루트, 2015), 《리얼 디엠지 프로젝트》(아트선재센터, 서울 / 동송세월, 철원, 2015), 《5회 안양공공예술프로젝트》(안양문화예술재단, 안양, 2016), 《고향》(서울시립미술관, 서울, 2019)에 참여하였다. 작가는 ‘콜렉티브 ps’ (편지글에서 ‘추신’에 해당하는 ‘postscript’의 줄임말로, 발화공간의 안과 밖, 그 사이에 존재하는 힘과 관계에 주목한다는 의미로 사용됨)를 결성하였는데, 이들은 〈리스닝 컴퍼니〉(아트스페이스풀, 2009)라는 듣기의 감각을 일깨우고 소리만으로 사건을 재구성하는 프로젝트를 시도했다. 김진주는 〈팟캐스트: 말하는 미술〉의 제작자이자 진행자로 활동했고(2015-17), ‘아그라파 소사이어티(Ágrafa Society)’의 일원으로 『제노페미니즘: 소외를 위한 정치학』(미디어버스, 아그라파 소사이어티, 2019)을 공역했고 페미니즘/퀴어 감각의 시각예술문화 웹저널 『SEMINAR』(2019-)를 공동으로 발행하고 있다.
Jinjoo Kim(b. 1981) is an artist, curator, researcher, who engages in expanding visual art and cultural practices. With consideration of listening and conversationing as artistic attitude and methodology, her conceptual and social artworks unfold a combination of text, video, photography, archives, installation, performance, public art and more that reveals her interests in fragmented and surviving images, performativity of language, coexistence of polarity. Kim recently had her solo exhibition Seismograpies (Hapjungjigu, Seoul, 2020), and has worked continuously with thematic approach through her series of Promises (2008–) on the politics of language acts as well as a project Collective and Individual Chorus (2013–) on embodied modernity and industrialization. She exhibited in several international group exhibitions including the screening session of Homeworks 7 (Ashkal Alwan, Beirut, 2015), Real DMZ Project 2015: Lived Time of Dongsong, and presented commission works at 5th Anyang Public Art Project (2016) and gohyang: home (Seoul Museum of Art, 2019). She participated in Home Workspace Program 2013-14 in Beirut and was selected for SeMA Nanji Residency 15th Artists (2021). Producing collectively, she formed the artist collective ps, a.k.a. ps. press or mspl, that run a psuedo company Listening Company (2018–) providing listening service in exhibition space; she took the main host of the podcast Talking Misul (2015–2016) which broadened the discourse on contemporary Korean art with guest artists; as a member of Ágrafa Society, she translated Xenofeminism: A Politics for Alienation by Laboria Cuboniks into Korean (2019) and is publishing and editing web journal SEMINAR (2019–) on queer and feminist visual art and culture. She writes about images and art including her master’s degree thesis in visual art theory Artists’ speech acts—with a focus on the Forth Group’s declaration and the manifesto on founding the Reality and Utterance (2016), etc.
