WEBZINE ACC

# Familiar yet Unfamiliar Story

We live in the era of new media in the 21st century. Most of all, the changes after computer as a new medium emerged and spread out are unprecedented compared to the technological invention in history. It did not take so much time for us to realize the fact that the introduction of new medium and its expansion is more than just technology. Now, it became a new culture that changed the society and the human life.

New medium and the introduction of new technology brought changes to so many parts in art as well. The impact made by the development of technology on art is unimaginably huge. With the grace of technology, new forms of art like photography and film have emerged, and accordingly, the way of producing art and accepting it also became largely different. The era of ‘Revolution of Images’ has arrived through technological imagination as a media philosopher Vilém Flusser said.

The technology in our period allows much more diverse ways to produce and enjoy art. Especially as the virtual and augmented reality contents that would have been possible in SF or movie are introduced through various ways as a new existence, the contents created by new technology are coming out in art as well.

The remote situation because of COVID-19 that struck the whole world put the era of metaverse, embodied in virtual space, forward, and all the daily life like meetings, shopping, and trips were held virtually. Also, the world of art utilizes the technologies like VR, AR, and Online Viewing Room (OVR) to create and share images of exhibits, performances, and art fairs through virtual art platform unbound by time and space.

New Technology Lab Based Creation and Production Workshop

# Namdo cultural heritage through the eyes of art

Asia Culture Center (ACC) runs the New Technology Based Content Lab Creation and Production Workshop to respond and lead this new technology. It was designed for the creation and production of creative convergence of art and technology, and through the Metaverse Creation Workshop about Namdo cultural heritage targeting related experts and workers, and the TouchDesigner Creation Workshop, it artistically reinterprets the Namdo cultural heritage.

The workshop is mainly divided into two parts: ‘Metaverse Creation Workshop’ and ‘Touch Designer Creation Workshop.’ ‘Metaverse Creation Workshop,’ a workshop that creates metaverse space where Namdo cultural heritage is artistically reinterpreted through art and technology, attempts the unique creation and production by using metaverse based on the expertise of an active creator. The co-founders of Studio mbus703, Ha Seok-june and Nho Chiwook, participate as guest lecturers, and through a total of 8 sessions is the whole process of creation and production of contents by using metaverse space from a basic theory lesson to 3D object production, 3D contents production, the Skybox practice using 360° images, and the final spatial composition.

TouchDesigner Creation Workshop, a workshop that specializes in visual programming by using TouchDesigner, attempts the multidisciplinary creation and production that extends the artistic experience through real time interactive performance by using data like the Shinan ship 3D data, one of the Namdo cultural heritage. CLAUDE, a Seoul-based media artist, participates as a creator to lead 4 sessions in total.

New Technology Lab Based Creation and Production Workshop

The participants of the Metaverse Creation Workshop will be divided into five groups, and each group will be asked to artistically reinterpret the Namdo cultural heritage and to showcase their final works. The first group will showcase <Yangnim-dong Fantasy>, the story of past and present Yangnim-dong, Nam-gu, Gwangju that transcends time and space. Group 2 is planning to create <Mokpo Dongmyeong 77stairs>, a way to Songdo Sinsa during the Japanese colonial era back then. I am so excited to see in what perspectives they will create the place of our miserable history and colonial disgrace. On the other hand, group 3 will reproduce the space of <Gwangju Ilshin Spinning> and show an exhibition inside it. It seems that the roofless exhibition space can be only seen in this metaverse. Meanwhile, group 4 is planning to create a space where the landscape and the feeling of water of Seyeonjeong will be depicted form <The Fisherman’s Calendar> by Gosan Yun Seon-do. The group 5 will virtually create the stairs leading to the Gamro stupa of State Preceptor Bojo Jinul. Songgwangsa is the place where the arrangement of temple buildings is based on the philosophy of good and non-Zen Buddhism, and the group tries to describe this philosophy centered around the Gamro stupa of State Preceptor Bojo Jinul.

# Building relationship between technology and art

Metaverse is an open space for imagination that does not require everything to be the same. The ACC's New Technology Based Content Lab Creation and Production Workshop is more meaningful in that regional cultural heritage and is the subject of futuristic media artworks where various high-tech and artistic ideas meet. Beyond the limitations of the existing digital heritage, merely a simple restoration or DB, local culture, and even Asian culture will be recreated as differentiated high-tech cultural heritage content in the metaverse.

New Technology Lab Based Creation and Production Workshop

After the creation and production workshop ended, I was able to talk to two participants, Lee Chae-rin and Kim Ha-rin, who are also filmmakers. Lee Chae-rin majored in the department of moving images and studied how to direct a film and some related programs. Kim Ha-rin studied creative techniques by herself and held her second solo exhibition through metaverse that made her decide to participate in this workshop.

They said, "I wanted to reinterpret Yangnim-dong, a familiar place where most people visit when they travel to Gwangju to enjoy while the unfamiliar modern and contemporary stories coexist." I am excited to see how symbolic places such as Dwingle Cave, Ilex Cornuta, and Stairs of Hardship in Yangnim-dong will be visualized through the metaverse.

All the final works from the New Technology Based Content Lab Creation and Production Workshop are on display at Space 1 from October 18 through November 6. I hope the participants’ challenge at the creation workshop to be as delicious as the fruit of autumn.

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