Casey Kaplan
Kevin Beasley | PANSORI: A Soundscape of the 21st Century at the 15th Gwangju Biennale
We are pleased to announce Kevin Beasley’s participation in PANSORI: A Soundscape of the 21st Century, the main exhibition of the 15th Gwangju Biennale.
Conflictual borders, anti-migration walls, confinement, social distance, segregation policies—these seemingly dissimilar topics share a common point: space and its political organization. The main effect of climate change is the apparition of a new world map in which carbon dioxide and urban life, desertification and migration, deforestation and social struggles, destruction of animal ecosystems and vegetal invasions, have become brutally interconnected.
PANSORI: A Soundscape of the 21st Century is an operatic exhibition about the space we live in. But as any landscape is also a soundscape, this exhibition is built as a narrative connecting musical and visual forms. Having emerged in 17th century Korea, pansori is a musical genre deeply rooted in its native land. In Korean,pansori literally means “the noise from the public place,” which could also be understood as the voice of the subalterns. The 15th Gwangju Biennale intends to recreate the original spirit of pansori, with artists that try to re-think the space shared between humans, machines, animals, spirits, and organic life— our relational space.
PANSORI: A Soundscape of the 21st Century is on view September 9 – December 1, 2024. For more information, please visit the Gwangju Biennale’s website.