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PRESS RELEASE
An untitled work by American painter Nina Chanel Abney hangs from the Jeon-il Building, a ten-story structure with peeling white paint across the street from the Asia Culture Center, one of the main exhibition halls of the Gwangju Biennale. The bottom half of the banner depicts a group of men in military fatigues standing over a deceased figure laid to rest. Above this scene are two figures raising their hands in a way that doesn’t look so much like surrender as it resembles the linking of arms in defense. There’s a floating pair of hearts, along with a numerical reference to May 18. As if in conversation with Abney’s banner, “LOVE LIFE” in graffiti letters to the left stretch vertically down a stairway of the building.
Bullet holes inside the Jeon-Il Building make these entreaties for peace quaint, if not belated. For nearly 40 years, the use of aerial artillery during the Gwangju Uprising was denied by the South Korean military before a recent government investigation corroborated eyewitness accounts of helicopters shooting at civilians. In the American context, Abney’s tribute to victims of state violence might resonate with any number of examples, whether it’s the murder of black people domestically or foreign civilians abroad. In Gwangju, Abney’s untitled work offers a possibility for transnational solidarity rooted in opposition to governments that collude or are complicit in the death of people.
