The Image from The Space

The place where the exhibition took place was a former building of the Agency for National Security Planning (K-CIA). It is a meaningful place in Modern Korean history, related to the Dictatorship of the nineteen sixties to the nineteen eighties. From the days of the Dictatorship government to the present democratic system, K-CIA secretly carried many undercover projects, such as wiretapping and individual surveillance related to political matters, usually against the ruling party. In 1995, K-CIA moved out from this compound and the government decided that this building complex would become the national art school. This decision entailed many complex situations but one can obviously speculate that it was an easy way to hush up its history.


As an exhibition space it would be constantly reshaped by exhibition design, the putting up and taking down of temporary structures and exhibits, and thus lose its original space, and its memory. The building was supposed to be demolished eventually, but it still stands. I photographed details, traces and remains of the original space before it was made into an exhibition white-box. Those images were then digitally printed in real-life size and exhibited on the white gallery walls but at the exact points in space where they belonged. Some of those traces still remained, but hidden by the new white walls, others had been obliterated by overpainting.


“We work in shadow but aim toward brightness.”
K-CIA’s (The Agency for National Security Planning) motto (1961- 1968).


Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
23 x 29.8 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
30.05 x 30.32 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
22.8 x 29.16 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
21.05 x 28.1 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
12.55 x 18.8 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
21.15 x 26.85 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
19.05 x 27.4 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
24.45 x 30.6 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
21.7 x 31.5 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
50.5 x 31.92 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
48.35 x 34.35 cm

Untitled, 2013
digital prined photography
12.45 x 19 cm