Tuesday 19 May 2015, 8pm
Korean audio-visual artists Hangjun Lee and Chulki Hong present two 16mm films alongside France-based Australian drummer / percussionist, Will Guthrie.
1. Film Walk (2012) 30min – Hangjun LEE & Chulki Hong
Film Walk replaces the perforations in the film stock with optical sound head. The perforations do not create images produced by the gate movement, but make ‘a hole a sound’ by the artist’s hand and his step speed with the numbers of sound coinciding with the length of time.
2. Phantom Schoolgirl Army (2013) 40min – Hangjun Lee & Chulki Hong, Will Guthrie
Phantom Schoolgirl Army is a powerful audiovisual performance based on a collection of military photographic portraits, and elaborates on the story of North Korean spies disguised as high school girls during the Yeosu-Suncheon rebellion of 1948. The South Korean government used this legend as anti-communist propaganda.
Hangjun Lee and Chulki Hong have collaborated together since 2006 – stimulating critical investigations into the performativity of practices in the darkroom, the screening room, the private recording/ practicing studio, and the public performance spaces utilised for the improvising musician.
This performance is presented in association with the Korean Cultural Centre UK.
Born in 1977, Hangjun Lee is a filmmaker and independent curator who also works as a programmer at EXiS in Seoul. He also curated screening & live media program such as Cinematic Divergence (2013) & Mujanhyang Festival (2014) for National Museum of Contemporary Arts (MMCA) in Seoul. His works are based on multi-projection and optical sound, often involving improvisations with a variety of artists. Since 2006 he has been working on an audiovisual research project, “Expanded Celluloid, Extended Phonograph” in collaboration with Hong Chulki, a noise improviser. Their collaboration stimulated critical investigations into the performativity of practices in the darkroom, the screening room, the private recording/ practicing studio, and the public performance spaces utilised for the improvising musician.
Born in 1976, Hong Chulki is an improvising/noise musician from Seoul, South Korea. With Choi Joonyong, he founded the first Korean noise music group Astronoise in 1997 and experimental music records label Balloon and Needle in 2000. His main instrument is amplified/unamplified turntables in the recent years. He has been active in audio-visual performance with Korean film artist Lee Hangjun under the name of Expanded Celluloid/Extended Phonograph. He has collaborated with several improvising/noise musicians including Ryu Hankil, Jin Sangtae, Joe Foster, Kevin Parks, Otomo Yoshihide, Sachiko M, Takahiro Kawaguchi, Jason Kahn, Bryan Eubanks, Will Guthrie, Aaron Dilloway and Okkyung Lee.
Will Guthrie is an Australian drummer / percussionist living in France. He plays solo using different combinations of drums, percussion, amplification and electronics, and leads the contemporary hybrid percussion / gamelan group ENSEMBLE NIST-NAH. His music has been released on labels such as Black Truffle, Editions Mego, Erstwhile, Clean Feed, Gaffer Records, Hasana Editions, 23five, iDEAL and his own label Antboy Music.
Regular collaborators past and present include Oren Ambarchi, Container, Sarah Hennies, Mark Fell, Roscoe Mitchell, Ahmed Ag Kaedy, James Rushford, Ghassen Chiba, Jean-Luc Guionnet, Erell Latimier, Chulki Hong, Mark Simmonds, Jérôme Noetinger, Keith Rowe, Ava Mendoza, the film maker Hangjun Lee and choreographer/dancer Mette Ingvartsen.
