1995, the initial year of Gwangju Biennale marked the 15th anniversary of the Gwangju Democratization Movement, a popular uprising against military dictatorship on 18th May 1980 and also commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Restoration of Independence of Korea. Possessing significant political meaning in Korean modern history, the Biennale was conceived as an event both to recall and honor the political and emotional memories of the Democratization Movement.

The inaugural Gwangju Biennale, which was opened with the theme “Beyond the Borders,” became one of the most important reference points of contemporary art history in Korea and functioned to enlarge critical discourses on exhibition and curating. Bypassing former events, the biennale foundation faced various difficulties to including last year’s inappropriate appointment of artistic director.

History

“Unmapping the Earth” and five sub-themes; Speed (Water), Space (Fire), Hybrid (Wood), Power (Metal), Becoming (Earth) were the theme for the 2nd Gwangju Biennale (1997). The five elements from Eastern traditional philosophy were matched with its interpretations in the contemporary societal culture.

The 3rd Biennale (2000) central theme of “Man + Space” explored the essential proposition of daily life and artistic activities. The main exhibition was divided among continents into Asia, Europe & Africa, North America, South America, Korea & Oceania and a Special Section. The 4th Gwangju Biennale (2002) was consisted with 4 Projects; “Pause,” “THERE-Sites of Korean”, “Stay of Execution” and “Connection.” The 5th Biennale’s theme was “A Drop of Water, A Grain of Dust” and the 6th Gwangju Biennale 2006 took ‘Asia’ as its theme with its title “Fever Variations.” The main exhibition “The First Chapter_Trace Root: Unfolding Asian Stories” took a diachronic approach to trace the root of the Asian spirit and was further divided into four sections: Myth and Fantasy, Nature and Body, Trace of Mind, and Past in Present.

Reporting Current Exhibitions

Bringing together a range of activities produced over a span of nearly eighteen months, the 2008 Gwangju Biennale “Annual Report: A Year in Exhibitions” will serve as a hosting site, incorporating activities into its galleries and satellite sites ranging from performances, readings, film screenings, music, dance, theater, to exhibitions initiated between January 2007 and September 2008.

The exhibition program is composed of three interconnected components:
“On the Road”: This section of the biennale consists entirely of traveling exhibitions produced and shown elsewhere between 2007 and 2008. It will be organized as a series of interlocking arguments, as a set of continuously elaborated relationships, juxtapositions, and structural contiguities, between cultural and exhibition contexts and institutional networks.
“Position Papers”: Selected from a series of Position Papers, about ten curators will be commissioned to propose an exhibition or project reflective current thinking on the state of contemporary art and culture. Each project is to be seen as a work in progress, a provisional essay towards a larger horizon, and therefore will lean towards the modesty, having no more than of five artists for each proposal.
“Insertions”: The third component of the project will be based on a series of new projects, especially commissioned for the biennale. These new projects, to be realized across different media and disciplines, will serve as punctuation marks throughout the itinerary of the exhibition. The projects will function as insertions within the general body of the exhibitions and as maintenance beyond limited duration.

Artistic director Okwui Enwezor is Dean of Academic Affairs and Senior Vice President at San Francisco Art Institute. He is Adjunct Curator at the International Center of Photography, New York. Ranjit Hoskote is a poet, cultural theorist, translator, and independent curator based in Bombay, India. Hyunjin Kim is a curator and a writer living and working in Seoul, previously serving as a curator of Vanabbemuseum, Eindhoven and the Rooseum Center of Contemporary Art, Malmö, Sweden, among other appointments.