DREAMERS’ GATHERING

Post Territory Ujeongguk, Seoul, South Korea | May-June 2021

Artist: Bongsu Park

Dreamers’ Gathering was a solo exhibition featuring the work of artist Bongsu Park, presenting an immersive sculptural installation, videos, and selections from the artist’s archive, which channel the multi-faceted power of dreams to facilitate social interaction.

An immersive installation filled the gallery’s ground floor with an ethereal dreamscape for audiences to view and interact with. Two large structures of hanging cloth, which visitors could enter inside of, were illuminated by projected visualizations of sleep brain waves. Each structure represents an evolving data portrait of a select number of participants who worked with the artist to record their brain waves while dreaming.

The galleries on the second floor showed video works exploring movement and dream rituals, as well as an archive of dream narratives which the artist has been collecting from participants in her workshops over the course of several years. Audiences could also write down their dreams and contribute them to the artist's archive. In addition, reference materials documenting dream psychology practices and the presence of buying and selling dreams in Korean history added contextual components to the artistic explorations on display.

For several years, Park has developed an ongoing practice exploring the interpersonal dynamics of Korean traditions of buying and selling dreams. Discussing and interpreting dreams, and exchanging them amongst friends and family is a popular way of identifying symbols that may shed light on a person’s present and future life. In Dreamers’ Gathering, the artist invited audiences to gather together and explore the intricacies of their dreams as traditional yet casual systems for self-reflection and self-actualization in everyday life.

Dream Auction

The Korean tradition of buying and selling dreams is a practice with rich social and historical layers. In a culminating event, dreams contributed by exhibition visitors and participants in the artist's workshops were auctioned off as a way of formalizing an informal practice, and honoring these contributions. The event offered a playful way to think about the process of transaction. The auction was not a commodification of such a transaction, rather it invited the audience to reflect on the practice of buying and selling dreams, and how it might exist beyond the material realm.

Byun Hongchul led the proceedings as auctioneer, reading each dream and then guiding participants in the auction process. Each dream was transcribed on a custom scroll made by the artist. Bidding took place live online and for a limited number of in-person guests. All profits from the auction were donated to Miral Welfare Foundation.

VIdeo by Studio MASIL