WEBZINE ACC

Since its opening in November 2015, the Asia Culture Center (hereafter referred to as the ACC) has pursued its mission to be a place of refuge for all and a cultural meeting spot for the citizens for the last seven years. In particular, the ACC operates a new type of an archive1) space in the form of the Library Park, one of the largest cultural spaces in Asia. This space houses the Book Lounge and Community Lounge spaces, which offer a place for refuge and communication to visitors; reading spaces (library), centered around expert works on Asian culture; exhibition experience and access space (museum), drawn from the archive; and Theater 3, which offers video screenings and performances.

The ACC Library Park began with the Library Park 1.0, a pre-open event that began in September 2015. After spatial improvement works in 2020, parts of the library were opened in May 2021, followed by the opening of the exhibition in November 25 of that year. Now, in 2022, the entirety of the Library Park was newly re-opened as Library Park 2.0.

To commemorate the re-opening of the Library Park in 2021, the ACC established an exhibition called "Testimony of Asian Identity and Experience created by modern and contemporary Asians" based on the archive collected and studied by the ACC. Through that, the ACC introduces facets of Asian culture that experts, creators, and the contemporaries all know, but do not know in depth, with cultural experiences that are designed to assist the viewers in mutual understanding and enjoyment of the culture.

Come and join us as we tour the new Library Park.

Library Park Permanent Exhibitions

• SchedulePermanent Exhibition
• Time10:00 - 18:00 (Tue, Thu, Fri, Sun)
  10:00 - 20:00 (Wed, Sat)
  * Closed every Monday
• VenueLibrary Park Permanent Exhibition
• Intended AudienceFor all ages
• FeeFree of charge
• ReservationFree admission
• Inquiries1899-5566

• Docent-led tour in the ACC exhibition
• Regular tour11:00, 13:00, 14:00, 15:00, 16:00, 17:00
  * Additional tour offered on Wed, Sat 18:30
• Time30 min. - 1 hr. *May be subject to change
• LanguagesKorean / English / Japanese
• How to ApplyOnline reservation, onsite application
• Tours in other languagesClick on English / 日本語 and submit the application downloaded via email

What do we know of Asia? What and how much do we know of "Asia" and "Asian cultures?" If one asks someone to name the Asian countries, people may say "China, Japan, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, and...", and if one asks them to talk about their history and culture, most would not be able to name things other than that of China and Japan. The ACC Library Park is the place that expands our knowledge of what Asia is. It is the place that widens our narrow perspective.

Library Park permanent exhibition infowall

The exhibition is made up of films, albums, newspapers, magazines, maps, and books collected by ACC during research and surveys; materials on Indonesian lifestyle, donated by the city of Delft in the Netherlands; and ACC’s own collection of documentaries, money, and postcards. By utilizing the digitally archived materials, it helps to facilitate the accessibility of its content to the visitors.

The permanent exhibition is made up of three categories, namely five thematic exhibitions, including Asian democracy, human rights, and peace; sounds and music; architecture; women; and migration, along with ACCex, an information space for cultural information in Asia; and VR experience halls for Asian intangible cultures, food, and architecture.

Map of the Library Park exhibition space

# The first space that one sees in the permanent exhibition is the ACCex

Overview of Asian culture DA_ACCex space

ACCex is a portmanteau of ACC, the English acronym for Asia Culture Center, and ex, a prefix drawn from exhibition and example. It refers to an information search and access system made up of a large 8.6x2.4m LED platform and a search kiosk.

ACCex uses digital media technology to organize digital information collected by ACC during its surveys, research, performance, and creation and production processes into searchable forms. When a visitor chooses a category of materials on the kiosk, materials in that category are displayed in the large monitor system. The visitor can then examine the information on videos, photographs, and descriptions displayed on the LED platform, and thereby tap into the vast reserve of Asian materials and research results in the ACC. If two search kiosks operate simultaneously, the media screen splits into two screens. In this way, the ACCex may be said to be an experiential information search exhibition that satisfies the intellectual curiosity of the visitors with advanced ICT.

In addition to continuously updating its digital archive, ACC plans to connect the ACCex system to all digital devices within the Library Park, so that it can be developed into a true reservoir of digital information on Asian culture.

# 5 thematic exhibitions: PSLAM

Next is the exhibition space known as PSLAM. PSLAM stands for Peace, Sound and music, Life, Architecture, and Migration and settlement, namely the five themes presented in the exhibition. This is the starting point of the visitor's journey into Asian culture.

After a video overview of the exhibition through the section P media wall,

the first theme, “Efforts toward peace in Asia_The way to peace in Indochina” details the journey toward independence and peace achieved by the former French colonies of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. This exhibition seeks to examine how the three states, in their goals of establishing an independent nation-state, re-establish the values of democracy and peace for themselves through various archive materials. Since Korea was also subjugated under colonial rule, and since Korea also sent soldiers to the Vietnam War, the three countries seemed to be connected to Korea in a certain way. Perhaps because of that, this space reminded me of Korea's own modern and contemporary history, and thus a sense of empathy.

The second theme, Asian sounds and music_Vietnam’s popular music: The life and music of Trịnh Công Sỏn examines the life and work of Trịnh Công Sỏn, a popular musician who was active in the 1960s and 70s in Vietnam and an eminent figure in the history of Vietnamese music. As a composer, singer-songwriter, and painter, Trịnh Công Sỏn wrote nearly 600 love songs and anti-war protest songs for the people of Vietnam. The exhibition included materials that testified to his musical and poetic world, such as albums and photographs, as well as experience spaces that allowed one to listen to his music. I had wondered to myself, "who is this? An Asian singer? I know Teresa Teng... I know Ho Chi Minh is Vietnamese..." I was then told, "in Korean terms, he would be like Kim Min-ki or Cho Yong-pil." For a moment, I thought I saw Trịnh Công Sỏn differently. What was that fleeting thought?

A DVD tribute to Trịnh Công Sỏn

My child, sleep well My yellow child, sleep well, I will care for you, just like I care for the bullets that painted the wounds red Twenty years, my children are in the military and they are yet to return. My yellow child, My child, sleep well . . (excerpt from a song written by Trịnh Công Sỏn)

Words like mother, yellow people, yellow skin are said to be recurring themes in Trịnh Công Sỏn's music. The figure of the mother and yellow skin both represent the Vietnamese people, and this song takes the form of a lullaby that a mother sings to a yellow child, as care for a people who suffered great sadness in their modern and contemporary history. The exhibition helped me understand how popular music had captured the hearts of the people in a period of historical and political upheaval, and how music took the lead in times of change.

The third theme, “Lives of Asian women_Iranian women’s lives onscreen”, places the lives of Iranian women under an Islamic state and women’s rights movement in terms of human rights.

A long time ago, I saw a movie called Wadjda. It was a film directed by Haifaa al-Mansour, the first woman director in Saudi Arabia. The poster immediately caught my eye with the quote, "why can't women ride bicycles?", and the movie then carved its presence in my memory with the answer to that question that I had found so foreign, and the glimpse that the movie offered into the lives of women in an Islamic state. This exhibition offered me a chance to listen to the voices of women in Iranian society, another Middle Eastern state, through expressions of their own gestures. That was the reason why the third theme left the strongest mark on my mind.

According to the brochure, this exhibition introduces the works of seven Iranian women directors, including that of Forough Farrokhzad, often considered to be one of the most important figures during the start of the Iranian New Wave. Their works focus on the lives of Iranian women and the realities of the Iranian society, and their critical gaze, cast from the position of actors struggling in Iran and the Islamic society, call for a change toward a better society.

Forough Farrokhzad [The House is Black]

• The camera captured patients suffering from leprosy in a leprosarium near Tabriz for 12 days. [The House Is Black] examines the belief that leprosy is an act of God, and how people sought to cure themselves with prayer. It was an accusation of how religious dogma exacerbates leprosy.
• Through this work, Farrokhzad won the trust of the patients and became their friend. That experience led to her adopting a child from two patients, and bringing the child to Tehran to live with her mother. Furthermore, [The House Is Black] imbued Farrokhzad with a new passion for contemporary literature, as well as artistic passion and will.

While not all videos were available in Korea, I could nevertheless understand the stories that they sought to express. Perhaps this is the power of the visual medium. ACC uses different media to help us understand Asian culture, and for me, this exhibition was the place where that effort truly shined.

The fourth theme, “Modern and contemporary architecture in Asia_Architects and the formation of a Nation”, presents the case studies of Kim Soo-geun (Korea), Geoffrey Bawa (Sri Lanka), Vann Molyvann (Sri Lanka), and Kenzo Tange (Japan) as an exploration of the significance and characteristics of architecture in the formation of a modern state.

Asian states accepted modernism in multiple forms, based on their environmental, cultural, and historical characteristics. These processes gave rise to problems and discussions different from that of the West. In architecture, acceptance of modernism included works that sought to apply the cultural and environmental conditions of the nation into the new form, along with efforts to reference and re-evaluate the traditional styles and materials. Sri Lanka, Japan, Cambodia, and Korea feature concrete cases of such deliberation and unique solutions, which are furthermore traceable to specific architects.

The basis for this exhibition, the research "Architects and the formation of a Nation", is centered around digitally archived materials. But during the preparatory work for a new permanent exhibition in 2021, the exhibition sought to add physical materials like books and photographs, blueprints, and models, so that visitors can enjoy greater accessibility and engagement with the subject matter. This exhibition space in particular has exhibitions that relate to Korea, and I think that things like VR experiences made the subject matter more engaging and interesting to the visitors. Furthermore, this exhibition also helped me examine the culture of Sri Lanka and other places that I was curious about, but was not able to access so easily, so that was for me an opportunity to broaden my understanding of diversity in Asia.

The exhibition Modern and contemporary architecture

The fifth theme, “Migration and settlement in Asia_Shaping a culture of coexistence”, examines the Chinese migration to Southeast Asia and the resulting Peranakan culture2) centered around Singapore. Chinese migration brought the culture and society of China together with other Asian societies and culture, birthing new cultures like that of the Peranakan. This exhibition investigates the ways how Asian cultures and societies came together to create new societies and culture through the example of the Chinese migration. I found uniquely-shaped vessels and a game table among the collected items in the exhibition. The ACC plans to continue updating this exhibition with other items collected from its research and survey activities, so the exhibition is certainly a thing for people interested in Asian culture to look forward to.

Peranakan-style cosmetics container

# Virtual Reality (VR) experience

Finally, the VR experience, located in the deepest space within the Library Park, covers themes like Tajik intangible cultural heritage, Indonesian Tongkonan, and the architecture of the Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa. This exhibition utilizes VR technology to re-enact the records beyond their specific site and time. In particular, the projection mapping VR space (circle vision) that showed a 270-degree view of Sri Lankan modern and contemporary architecture offered a sense of spatiality and realism like being actually present in the building. Personally speaking, I truly feel that this space is worth experiencing, so I hope that visitors will make sure to go to the innermost space in the exhibition to experience the space.

The circle vision exhibition in Asian Culture VR

Experiencing the Asian Culture VR

The ACC Library Park is dedicating a significant effort to shape itself as an integrated cultural space where people can access archived materials, exhibit photographs, videos, and other media, and experience (through VR, etc.), and thereby allow the citizens to share information, rest, and enjoy the benefits of culture in the city center. It strives to continuously expand its collection of Asian cultural resources, present the collected resources in a systematic way so that everyone can enjoy the diversity of Asian cultures freely, and offer programs that can build a rapport on Asian cultures, so that it can serve as a catalyst for the utilization and re-production of the archive and a space that facilitates the sharing and dissemination of Asian culture.

Academic Researcher Bae Jae-hoon, who is responsible for this exhibition, told me that the Library Park is planning to develop talks, lecture workshops, screenings, and other programs based on the "Testimony of Asian Identity and Experience created by modern and contemporary Asians" archive, and that he is looking forward to the attention of the visitors.

The programs are as follows:

Poster of the Library Park program_A March of those who have left: Women and Migration

For more information on the Library Park permanent exhibitionClick to proceed to webpage