The Korea Foundation is upset by a display of North Korean propaganda posters outside the British Museum’s Korea Room under the theme "Contemporary Korean Art". The posters bear such bellicose slogans as, "Bear this in mind, world. Those who mess with out great undertaking will become our target."
The foundation, which gave 1.2 million pounds in 2000 to establish the Korea Room, wrote to the British Museum on Wednesday expressing concern that the warlike propaganda posters were placed right in front of the Korea Room. The National Museum of Korea, which has loaned about 20 Korean artifacts to the museum, also plans to write to the British Museum saying the posters do little to elucidate Korean art and may harm a mood of reconciliation between the two Koreas.
The Korea Room is on the third floor of the British Museum, and the exhibition is in the lobby that leads to it. The Korea Room curator said the North Korean items on display were directly purchased by the museum in 2001 because it was “important to collect contemporary North Korean art for future generations." She added they had just been hung and are changed every year.
Korean experts say the problem is less that the posters are being exhibited but that they are touted as "Contemporary Korean Art." A legend explains, "Artists flourished with Korea's rapid economic development," and summarized trends in contemporary Korean art, such as the influence of Seoul National and Hongik universities and the appearance of "minjung" art. But it fails to explain that the pictures next to it are North Korean propaganda posters or what they have to do with any of these South Korean factors.
Ahn Hwi-jun, the head of the Cultural Properties Committee, said, "That posters inspiring people to war are put up as works of art leads to questions about the quality of the curator." The British Museum put up two North Korean propaganda posters in the same place in early 2002 but removed them after protests from South Korea.
(engishnews@chosun.com)
