A Strange City 4, 2022
137 × 210mm, 268page
ISBN: 979-11-970333-6-0
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Book Cover (Front / Back)︎︎︎
Participaints
Hae Chan Kang, Seo Jung Kim, Da Kyung Lee,
Hye Rin Lee, Sun A Jeong
On December 10, last year, Epic Games unveiled 'Unreal Engine 5' along with a demo game based on the worldview of the movie 'The Matrix'. Several features such as ‘Nanite’ and more realistic graphics suggest new possibilities for the metaverse (or the future). Not to mention, there are about 7,000 buildings, 1,248 intersections, 27,848 streetlights, 12,422 manholes, 45,073 parked cars, 35,000 meta-humans, etc. because it's in. This effectively tells the user that they can interact with most objects. However, at the same time, human cells replaced by polygons and bodies applied to templates are used, and they are also mixed in a group of 'bots'. If so, where is the boundary between human and non-human and the distinction between virtual and real in this situation?
Directed by Denis Villeneuve, Contact (Original Title: Arrival) depicts the process of linguistic expert "Louis Banks" and scientist "Ian Donnelly" contacting 12 extraterrestrial flying objects throughout the planet and interpreting the letters of alien life, also called “Heptaford". They start by sharing simple words with each other, and gradually reach the level of complex sentences. Nevertheless, emotions are still not easy to convey. This is because emotions are interchangeable in context and context, not text. Imagine that in the very distant future, we will really encounter life from another planet. How can we communicate when we are ignorant of each other's language? Furthermore, can joy, sadness, and more complex emotions be conveyed?
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Spine
According to ‘Merabian’s Law’3, it is said that in the process of communication with others, visual (55%) and auditory (38%) factors are greatly influenced than language (7%). In other words, non-verbal expressions4 are as important as verbal expressions such as the content of words. For example, we often remember the impression of others through facial expressions and gestures. In some cases, they only hear the sound of their foot steps and notice who they are. In addition, we can read their tendencies through what music they listen to, what brand of clothes they wear, and how they eat. In this way, we continue to give and receive unspoken expressions. However, it is not limited only to human-to-human communication. Animals also communicate with their fellows or humans through their own non-language. Here, I would like to extend the scope of 'the other' to non-human life, and propose 'non-verbal communication' as an answer to the previous question.
Each of the five participants presents their own answers as a concrete practice. First, the participants look for subjects to experiment with. It includes unconscious habits, the appearance of favorite idol group, symbols drawn on classic innovations and modern memes. They then investigate and classify two aspects of the various nonverbal features that can be found therefrom. The first is the objective aspect. It becomes a framework (system) for visualization, and includes factors such as 'direction, order, position'. The second is the subjective aspect. It is a flesh (form) that is overlaid on a framework created through the system. This focuses on the 'emotional aspect (subjective), redefines it in their own language, and creates a 'visualization axis'.
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Body (Contents, Introduction)
For example, instead of simply "habit when happy / habit when sad (Hyerin Lee – what it contains)" it is redefined as "habit when good ideas come up / habit when you are at a loss because you don't know what they mean," and the opposite two elements are listed on one axis. It gives an intuitive shape to the extremes of this individual axis. At this time, the range of expression (size, concentration, feeling, etc.) in the intuitive form is up to a state that the other person can sufficiently understand through additional explanation. Circular and angular forms represent different emotions and coexist on one screen (Seojung Kim – Audible Sentence). In conclusion, the work (main image and subimage as variation) is carried out through repetition and combination of the above two processes.
…
At the end of the game demonstration, I felt that visualized non-language could work as evidence of intelligence if I perceived it similarly to reality without stepping on the ground. It's like 'this project is a joke about the future ahead. It may look like that of alien life in SF movies. But we have seen countless past jokes become reality. Therefore, wouldn't the day come when these attempts gain some kind of effectiveness? In addition, I thought that the "city" indicated by the title of this workshop was no longer limited to the world of senses, but could be expanded beyond it. In the meantime, we have held three workshops of the same name, and we have always tried to extract themes and subjects from physical cities. However, I am trying to break away from it in earnest through this opportunity. At the end of the day, the key is not in the city, but in the 'stranger'.
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Body (Hae Chan Kang, Action, Type, Emotion)
HAE CHAN KANG
On Fridays at the end of the week, I tend to drink alone. I repeat the feelings of the week when I'm having a hard time and when I'm happy, but it's not just when I'm alone.
Emotional exchange through the behavior of drinking occurs in a variety of ways, including family, friends, and co-workers. When you're happy, you go with alcohol, when you're happy, and when you're hard, you go with alcohol. Depending on my emotions, you can find a difference in the type of alcohol and how I drink it.
Based on these differences, I tried to create a graphic system like letter. There are countless types and ways to drink alcohol, but I have compiled them based on my personal favorite ‘Somaek’. I sets up photoshop effects that can be reminiscent of main type, capacity, ratio, and behavior, and reproduces actions through action functions. These fixed action settings can be used as a way to create specific graphics and express emotions. The graphics to come out are my emotions, but if you follow a fixed action setting, they can be used as a means of communication such as language.
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Body (Seo Jung Kim, Audible Sentence)
SEO JUNG KIM
I was interested in the lyrics. To be precise, I was interested in the difference between writing written/read on paper and writing called/heard in music. The one I was most interested in was the lyrics for the drama OST. I thought that one of the great characteristics of music is to revive many memories when you listen to it, so I thought that the drama OST shows that characteristic particularly well. This is because the drama OST is aired for a longer period of time compared to other media, so the life span is long, and the scenes in the drama are leaning on one's own memories and thus contain more memories. In that way, I was interested in the fact that the text becomes a sound and that the sound revives a lot of memories.
This work was to create audio spectrum focusing on the lyrics of the drama OST. Unlike the existing audio spectrum that responds to frequencies, I wanted to visualize more than just sounds. I thought of hypnosis because it revives memories, and I brought a system of hypnosis and built a system. Pendulum used for hypnosis and fire were used as basic materials for visualization. I made an experiment tool to do an experiment on my own. The lit candle was moved left and right, and the candle wax dripped under it. The notes to be played were arbitrarily defined, and two colored candles were used to give the difference between the ‘sum of words with a hanging note’ and ‘sum of words without a hanging note’. In this way, I made various candle wax shapes by swinging two colored candles as much as the number of letters (1 to 9). And I scanned the wax. I made a circle reminiscent of a clock (time) with the scanned candle wax. The circles were made in three sizes, and the larger the size of the sum of words that better express emotions, the bigger the circle. The circles are arranged according to the expression of the main character in the scene that best expresses the OST. In order to express various emotions, I made more than a circle shape. The classification of emotions such as joy, sadness, and anger seems to make complex and subtle emotions rather simple, so I made a variant that can express more abundantly. The vertical axis was divided into before-middle (ing)-after of love. Jeon expressed the appearance before becoming a certain form. The middle (ing) expresses the continuous form and the finished appearance, and the latter expresses the original form divided and the inner form of the middle (ing) is expressed. The horizontal axis divides emotions into simple → complex.
I can select one form from the table that is most suitable for each OST appraisal and use it. Alternatively, various forms can be applied in a complex manner to each lyric. For example, ‘If it were you’, written by Kim Mi-jin, is a song about unrequited love, but it contains all the complex emotions of before, during, and after (ing), so it can be expressed using various forms. And in order to express the emotion of ‘ing’ that was completed in the expression as incomplete, the form could be modified and included. ‘Becoming the Wind’, written by Athena and eNa, is a song of ‘who’ emotion, but still has a great ‘ing’ emotion, so I was able to create a new form by combining the two forms. Depending on the complex emotions you feel, you will be able to create an audio spectrum in more diverse forms.
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Body (Da Kyung Lee, Dream In A Dream)
DA KYUNG LEE
I'm serious about k-pop. Not to mention my school days, I am still practicing ‘K-pop is my life’ even now that I have grown up. You may think that you simply like idols, but that is the basics and I really like storytelling that starts for a single song or group to come out, art film, teaser video, music video, album, album layout, images, graphics, and follow-up MD products, etc. I especially like the conceptual design that comes out.
The group I'm interested in these days is NCT, but in fact, even those who are interested in K-pop, there are many people who do not fully understand the unique system of NCT, and it is difficult for me to understand clearly when I ask someone who is far from K-pop. (I felt it at this workshop.) Still, to briefly introduce this group, as the group consists of a multi-unit system, each song has a different member for each unit and within the unit, but SM Entertainment, the agency, woven this into a dream (DREAM). In other words, they are related to each other in a dream in the set story, and their worldview can be summarized as Mongjungmong, a dream in a dream.
First of all, what about the language they use when they talk in their dreams beyond different dreams? I was interested in There is a physical limitation to looking at all dreams, so I selected the most subjective playlists of the current representative units NCT127 and NCTDREAM. made. And when I had a vague thought of “I want to be in this dream too” while working, I decided to bring these forms into my dream. I organized the emotions I felt when consuming NCT's music and music videos, and based on these emotions, I set the coordinates of my dream. And I made a map of my dream by locating their character, which I made first.
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Body (Hye Rin Lee, What It Contains)
HYE RIN LEE
This work started with my notes. I doodle very often. To be honest, I doodle so often and unconsciously that I didn't even know if I was a frequent scribbler. I thought it would be interesting to work on the behavior I was doing without even being aware of it, so I decided to make this topic a doodle. After choosing the subject to be doodle, when I looked back at the doodle I had drawn in class, there were quite a few things in the doodle. The thoughts and feelings I had during that time, my interest in the class, and the level of concentration. I could even see how hungry I was. It was interesting to be able to read my state and thoughts while looking at the notes, and I tried to express that through visual language. Like the 'Heptapod' language in the movie Contact (Arrival, 2016), I wanted to create a wonderful viusal language that allows you to know the past, present, and future even by looking at a single picture.
First of all, since most of my notes are written in class, I tried to capture the emotions and situations I experienced in class. First of all, I have narrowed down the four things that affect me the most in class. The four factors are 'fatigue', 'concentration', 'professor's feedback', and 'my worries about the next task'. Each factor was divided into a level from 1 to 6 to express the degree. The elements I used to visualize the four elements were inspired by the two scribbles that I saw the most in my notes. The two doodle looks similar and have opposite tendencies. One is a doodle that draws a smooth curve at once and gives a soft impression, and the other is a doodle that looks angular and a little sharp as if the light is splitting it. The two doodles were modified and used for each item. The elements visualized in this way were placed solely based on my memory. The things that are too old to remember are expressed in a small size, as if they are disappearing, and the relatively recent events are expressed in a large, clear and vivid manner.
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Body (Sun A Jeong, Connection of Rainbow Painting)
SUN A JEONG
Last fall, while walking in front of Dongdaemun and City Hall Stations, I met the Hyuk-Pil painter Seoksan. In order to make a meaningful gift to my acquaintances, I have been looking for painter Seok-san for two days and receiving a painting. Hyuk-Pil is a culture that conveys meaning through characters that have developed in the past, and is disappearing in contemporary times. Hyuk-Pil is an art that shared the joys and sorrows of ordinary people in the past, and it has the characteristics of meeting many audiences and making street creations easy because of the simple materials. I was also able to meet Hyuk-Pil, what has crossed a long time from the past to the present, on the street. Hyuk-Pil, what is like a talisman that embodies the wishes of ordinary people, not only draws on a single sheet of paper the amulet for good luck (Gilhyunghwabog), longevity (Mubyeongjangsu), and recovery from the most commoner’s point of view and at an affordable price, but also prays for peace, love, and prosperity, and is an indicator of life for the public. It even took on the role of discipline and discipline.
I tried to create a new character that connects the past and the present by applying these meanings, symbols, formative characteristics, and color characteristics of Hyuk-Pil. In order to reinterpret the meaning most often used in the past in the history, as a contemporary symbol, and to make it in the form of a character, a system based on the characteristics of the Hyuk-Pil was built.
In order to reinterpret Hyuk-Pil as a symbol of modern times, it was necessary to select a material. Hyuk-Pil drew objects in nature, such as turtles, carps, bamboo, and butterflies, with materials symbolizing the meaning of good luck and good health and longevity. Since each symbol symbolizes a different meaning, the material drawn could be different each time depending on the meaning contained in the Hyuk-Pil. So, to express these characteristics, memes and new words that are closely related to the lives of modern people and contain various meanings were designated as modern symbols. Memes and new words, like the characteristics of Hyuk-Pil in the past, are elements that contain joy, sorrow, and various meanings, so I thought they were suitable for use as materials for this work.
In order to establish a system that connects the past and the present based on the characteristics of Hyuk-Pil, the four meanings that ordinary people in the past longed for the most were selected.
1. longevity / 2. Hapiness / 3. Name of adoption / 4. Good relationship
Hyuk-Pil symbols (natural materials) corresponding to each meaning were classified, and contemporary memes and new words were collected. Reflecting the characteristics of Hyuk-Pil, which expresses the symbol in a simplified way, the symbolic elements were extracted from the modern meme and the symbol elements were extracted and simplified, and then the symbolic elements of the past and the present were combined.
Hyuk-Pil’s extraction elements are placed at the bottom, and meme extraction elements are placed at the top to combine. In addition, additional visualization work was carried out by providing different directions for each meaning by constructing a system based on the five colors and the corresponding five directions, which are the color characteristics of Hyuk-Pil. The final graphic element was derived by rotating the combined image according to the direction of each meaning, and additionally combining it with the existing combined image to transform (simplify) it.
In order for the final graphic element to take on the shape of a character, it was placed up and down reflecting the formative characteristics of Hyuk-Pil to visualize the character diagram that connects the past and the present. As an additional work, a poster with various meanings within a single character diagram was produced through graphic combination by meaning.