Art night

A few Fridays ago, 2 of my students invited me to go with them to Seoul's PechaKucha night. PechaKucha night is a special kind of art show where different architects, painters, film directors, dancers, etc. have 6 minutes to display and discuss their work. If they use powerpoint, they can only show 20 slides. Usually there are about 10 presenters for each show, so you get to see a lot of different art. Pecha Kucha night occurs all over the world, so if this sounds cool, you should definitely find your city's next date and check it out.

The event was packed with students, professors, and the artsy type. Really, a breath of fresh air compared to what I usually see when I go out. While I was definitely interested in exposing myself to some new art, I have to admit that I was also there to check out the women. For the most part, the girls were hot.... but all very very focused on the art. Not even the complimentary open bar could draw them away.

I think an artist troop called Urban Pajama put the show together. I guess they chose the literal route and so pajamas were worn throughout.

In true "cool-artsy-academic" form, a capoeira band opened the night. It was nice to hear some raw beats, and they were exciting to watch. Woosang, one of my students, commented, "In the US, people would be dancing right? In Korea, people don't know how to have fun to this music." Maybe that's true, but I bet a few more drinks and everyone would have gotten down.

Like any art show, there was some work that awesome and some that I just didn't understand. And forget about the explanations... the artists' vocabularly was way over my head and so I spent most of my time just thinking about the images. Woosang made a good point saying, "Sometimes it's nice not to understand what the artist is saying. You look at the pictures, and can have an open mind to brainstorm your own thoughts." I actually think that this idea can sum up much of my time in Korea. Watching television, hanging out with friends, or just people watching, I have the time to really pay attention with my eyes and think because I don't have to worry about language as much.

Just a note: I didn't take these photos. Woosang got them from a friend who helped organize the night.

BTW. To get more info on Pecha Kucha, I googled "Pecha Kucha Korea 2009". One of the links that shows up is this. A blog written by a dude named Jason. He's 27, Korean American, and from New York. Uh, and his pictures have a striking resemblance to mine (but he needs to add more contrast). Weird.