We are proud to announce our Fall 2023 Korean Diaspora Films and New Media Series! Join us throughout the semester as we celebrate and learn from/with three critically-acclaimed artists of the Korean Diaspora. Each one employs various mediums to engage with topics such as transnational adoption, the Korean War and division, and the global diasporic experience.
Read on to learn more about each artist.
On Thursday, September 7, we will be joined by Dr. Soni Kum, the Hanes Visiting Artist for Fall 2023. Soni Kum is an interdisciplinary artist born and raised in Tokyo, Japan as a third-generation Korean. We will screen her short film “Morning Dew” about the lives of Zainichi Koreans, specifically those who are “ex-returnees,” or Zainichi Koreans who once lived in North Korea and have defected. Following the screening, Dr. Kum will deliver a talk describing the development of “Morning Dew” and the challenges encountered in using archival footage.
Learn more about the event here.
On Tuesday, October 3, we will host a screening of Jane Jin Kaisen’s “The Woman, The Orphan, and The Tiger” (2010). Jane Jin Kaisen is a visual artist, filmmaker, and Professor at the School of Media Arts, The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. The film explores how the feeling of multi-generational trauma creates a sense of being haunted. Kaisen follows a group of international adoptees and other women of the Korean diaspora, uncovering how the return of the repressed confronts and destabilizes narratives that have been constructed to silence histories of pain and violence inflicted onto the bodies and lives of women and children.
Learn more about the event here.
On Wednesday, November 8, there will be a screening of Deann Borshay Liem’s “Geographies of Kinship” (2019). This film follows four Korean adoptees returning to their birth country and recovering their personal histories that were lost when they were adopted. The film explores the international adoption industry and the development of South Korea as one of the adoption capitals in the world.
Learn more about the event here.
On Wednesday, November 9, we will host Emmy-award-winning documentarian Deann Borshay Liem for a director Q&A following a screening of her new documentary, “Crossings” (2021). In Crossings, a group of international women peacemakers sets out on a risky journey across the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea, calling for an end to a 70-year war that has divided the Korean peninsula.
Learn more about the event here.
This series is made possible through generous support from the following sponsors: Korea Foundation, UNC Department of Art and Art History, UNC Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, UNC Film Studies. Each event will be CLE credit eligible.