Ryu Sung-sil’s ‘The Consuming Adoration Tune’ exposes base longing for abundance pervasive in Korea’s neoliberal market economy
By Park Han-sol
What anticipates guests at the Atelier Hermes, a display settled in Gangnam, southern Seoul, after they pass by a large number of columns of very good quality garments and an extravagant bistro, is a long ways past their most out of control minds: a canine memorial service.
Regardless of whether one has never gone to a dedication administration for a canine, they’ll presumably realize something is off immediately. Situated at the entry is a computerized screen enumerating the data about the departed: a 14-year-old Bichon Frise named Gongju.
However, what grabs the attention much more is a meeting with the imaginary President of Large Ruler Canine Burial service that plays on a circle in the corner.
“Our canine clients are harmless to the ecosystem. Do you have any idea about how much contamination happens when you consume human bodies? The expense of fuel utilized by crematoriums alone emerges to 50 million won a month,” the President states seriously.
“Notwithstanding, with regards to our canine clients, they can go to paradise for simply a modest quantity of fuel. Isn’t so fantastic?
The finish of his terrifying assertion is an indication for the crowd to continue on toward the following stage. In the display stands a virtual heater that is prepared to start a 10-minute incineration process.
The video meeting comprises of a completely turbulent tangle of occasions. After Gongju’s body is set inside the heater, under the watch of the lamenting proprietor, the two cremators show, in vainglorious visuals, how the canine is “being shot up in a rocket” to a rainbow-hued canine paradise. One even presents herself as an “creature communicator” moved by the soul of the dead canine, calling the wailing proprietor, “Mother.”
Seeing the whole cycle change ― from a site of grieving into a gaudy showcasing trick to benefit from the client’s personal weakness ― will probably leave a sharp desire for guests’ mouths.
The virtual pet crematorium, designed by visual craftsman Ryu Sung-sil as a component of her most recent independent display,
welcomes the crowd into an ostentatious industrialist bad dream.
Named “The Consuming Adoration Melody,” the show is a kitschy critique on neoliberal Korean culture’s obsession with lucrative plans and material prosperity. It’s a particularly captivating show, taking into account that it unfurls inside the leader Hermes store in the core of the upmarket neighborhood of Gangnam.
“Somebody once let me know it is profoundly likely that a significant number of the ongoing Gangnam occupants weren’t brought into the world around there, in light of the fact that the district didn’t arise (as the most extravagant area in Korea) until generally as of late. They probably rushed there from different pieces of the Korean Promontory; be that as it may, everybody there goes about as though they were brought up in Gangnam,” the 29-year-old craftsman told The Korea Times in a new meeting.
She saw that such a fixation on a world class childhood and abundance could address one part of Korea’s specific monetary sensibilities, as the country’s quick development carried similarly quick changes to individuals’ monetary situations with.
One of Ryu’s essential concentrations throughout the long term has been on uncovering the extraordinary, base human craving for abundance common in Korea’s neoliberal market economy ― imperfections and everything.
Truly, sending off such a punch at free enterprise’s eagerness to take advantage of anything for benefit has been a way gone by numerous different makers before. However, what makes Ryu’s investigate significant is that she turns to her own made-up universe of effectively unmistakable characters ― with their pretentious looks and vigorously controlled voices ― and a persuading plot that cows into incorrigible humor.
She utilizes three repeating fundamental characters in her entrepreneur story: Cherry Jang, Natasha and Lee Dae-wang.
Jang, performed by the craftsman herself on web based stages like YouTube and AfreecaTV, is a force to be reckoned with and a pseudo assessment pioneer, whose powdered face and tacky ensembles never neglect to catch the watcher’s eye.
The person effectively plays with producing benefits from counterfeit news, as she dispatches an unwarranted paranoid fear that North Korea has terminated atomic rockets towards Seoul and urges watchers to buy “citizenship to paradise
The introduction of Jang was somewhat propelled by the craftsman’s own insight of broadcasting herself online on AfreecaTV. “It was fascinating to speak with the anonymous masses while I had my own face uncovered. It seemed like an odd otherworld, an untamed wilderness that was the direct inverse of white shape exhibitions,” she said.
Natasha is indistinguishable in appearance to Jang. What separates them is her identity and her work. As a self-broadcasted “outsider” of obscure ethnicity, Natasha communicates in Korean with an irregular emphasize. Filling in as a nearby local escort for a made up distant land called Ching Chen, she brings in cash by professing to offer a sample of “exoticism” to older Korean hicks.
Be that as it may, the star of the continuous show at the Atelier Hermes is Lee Dae-wang, who refers to himself as “Mr. Large Lord.” Alluded to as Jang’s “Enormous Ruler Oppa (sibling)” and Natasha’s manager as the proprietor of a travel service (Huge Ruler Travel), Lee is depicted as a go getter business visionary who is never reluctant to extend his business through wild broadening.
“During the Coronavirus pandemic, which shut down global outings, Lee’s Large Lord Travel came to endure also. The main business that was popular at the time was burial service administrations,” Ryu noted.
“He looked at an opportunity to begin a commemoration administration business and before long found that an assistance for canines would be especially productive. This was on the grounds that the creatures were more modest in size, which would go through substantially less fuel when incinerated. Likewise, because of their more limited life range when contrasted and people, this would ensure a higher turnover proportion.”
