 The first of our thanks for inviting me to have a great chance to discuss about lesbian arts in Korea. I personally wrote about homosexuality in some way. This paper relates to my personal experience too. Anyhow, we have to really rush to meet up the time, the limits. The title of my paper is Different Unnies Coming, Project Elle Lesbian, the first exhibition of lesbian arts in Korea. Here I need to explain a little bit about the title. The Unnie is elder sister in Korea. I got this title as a kind of reaction against the Unnies Back, another big survey exhibition of feminist art in 2008 in Korea. It's somehow the exhibition catalogue mentions about post-feminism, but how a success of feminist arts and a big presence of feminist arts in Korea. Certainly, the exhibition does not include the lesbian artists in Korea, so that's the really beginning point that I got this paper as well as the titles coming from, The Different Unnies Coming. How has the issue of sexuality, particularly female homosexuality, been treated by various feminist organizations and groups in Korea? How might we characterize the relationship between queer theory and identity politics of some lesbian artists over recent decades? In order to answer these questions, the study takes up the example of Project Elle Lesbian, 2005. The first exhibition organized by self-proclaimed female homosexual and bisexual artists in Korea. This paper traces the preparatory phase of Project Elle from May 2004 until its opening in June 2005, dealing with the controversy that led to its cancellation as part of the working festival, a popular feminist event held at Korean universities. It also contrasts the dominant theoretical stance of feminist artists and creators in Korea. Those of Project Elle team, the predicament that the Project Elle team has during the process of organizing the exhibition, shows light upon the development and edits toward the feminist lesbian sexual politics found within feminist organizations in Korea. Another important aspect of social attitudes toward the female homosexual in Korea is what the Project Elle team has called, quote, the intentional indifference of society in the catalog. Indeed, within feminist organizations and art work in Korea, the most common reaction toward the female homosexuality or bisexuality has been silence. According to Michel Foucault, things that one is forbidden to name are at least the indicator of the absolute limit of discourse, quote, we must try to determine the different ways of not say such things, how those who can and those who cannot speak of them are distributed, which type of discourse is authorized or which form of discretion is required in either case. Foucault is primarily concerned with the silence as important strategy adopted by people who are usually classified as a sexual perverse or abnormal. He also notes, quote, there is not one, but many silences, quote, such an understanding of silence will be of special importance in decoding the common reactions toward the feminist female homosexuality inside feminist organizations, study groups, and feminist-oriented curatorship. So let's move to... The Exhibition Project L team was initially... Project L was initially planned as a part of a working festival in August 2004. The annual working festival, Meaning Demonstration Festival, began in 1999 and is held at various universities with the aim of promoting positive image of the natural female body and female sexuality. The festival is composed of main and free sections. In main section, performance artists, dancers, and pop singers were invited, whereas in free section, members of a canvas community share their stories and perception related to menstruation and other sexual matters in sight. The Exhibition Plan for Lesbian Arts, to be included in the main event, was Cancer Hive, after a series of debates and conflicts between the Reagan Festival Committee and the exhibition team. Just a week before the opening of the exhibition and two weeks before the opening of the entire festival, the exhibition team issued a document, quote, Anti-Feminism and Homophobia, quote, which presented the argument that the difference between the groups could not be reconciled immediately after this conflict. The Festival Committee and the exhibition team updated their statement on the onionette, one of the major cyber networks for feminists and feminists sympathizers in Korea. According to the members' committee, the two before the opening, they had not been provided with the detailed information about the exhibition. Until the meeting, the committee had a very vague idea about the exhibition, understanding only that it will include lesbian-related arts, not that it be just about lesbian artists and art. The committee's response in Hawaii may reflect an unavoidable gap between the art world and non-art world that develops when certain terms, procedures and practice common within the art world are not easily communicated to persons outside of the art profession. However, the more important aspects of Festival Committee's response was assertion that the scope of the exhibition might not be consistent with the Festival's annual theme, a symptom before the working. This response appeared absurd to the exhibition team, however, especially considering the committee's initial statement that anything that can represent or be involved with the feminist dance, it would be fine. The problem based upon the reading of the document might seem to rest upon the theme itself, the first exhibition of lesbian arts in Korea. The Festival Committee initially advised the exhibition team to use more oblique phrases such as sisterhood or sisterly love. Therefore, the committee's members' openness toward anything involved with a feminist dance did not seem to include the issue of female homosexuality. In previous working Festival, various efforts have been made to encourage more positive perception. Here's a free event, and then you're supposed to write about your personal experience. Actually, it looks like artistic work, but the main intention is not to really create the really arty artistic work. This is an alternative home-made menstruation pad. One aspect of it is to educate the people about the hazardous effects that commercially produce the menstruation pad. You get an explanation of a menstruation cycle and a step-member to try to explain to the males and this thing. In 2004, the Festival introduced special exercises and gymnastic movements to elevate the complications related to menstruation. In 2005, participants were invited to try at herbs and other natural remedies used for further protection of the women's vagina during the period. Additional medical knowledge was thought to appear to the public due to its familiarity, popularity, as well as a scientific reliability. To reiterate, the working Festival was intended to combine feminist ideas with the methods that appear to wider public in respect of age and gender. The difficult relationship between lesbian artists and the working committee partly stemmed from gender politics deeply rooted in the idea of women's biological body. To make matters worse, traditional medical knowledge relying upon the dual principle of in and young affirmed the rigid binary between femininity and masculinity. In terms of the contradictions involved with the Festival committee's openness toward anything related to a feminist stance, one instead deserves a particular attention. When the exhibition team and the committee finally visited the exhibition site on August 19, 2004, one Festival step-member argued that the artist should be least sensitive about the possible coming out. People were probably not recognized identity of artists merely based upon the appearance of the artwork. Don't you think you're overreacting? This remark was in response to the lesbian artist's expression of fears about vandalism. Although the intellectual environment of Kangok University was in many ways ideal for introducing new ideas, the artists were concerned that the works installed in an open space might be the target of homophobic reactions by some university students. The artists, therefore, faced important disclosure dilemma related to sexual identity whereas the Festival step-members who were least mindful of this dilemma went on to suggest that keeping artists' actual names and identity undisclosed. How the working Festival committee tried to underplay the sexual lives of lesbian artists points to a common situation facing lesbians in various feminist organizations in Korea. According to Counselor for Lesbian, and also the author of the article, Lesbian Wondering in the Double Space 2007, who served as the Counselor for Lesbian Research Organization in Korea, many feminist groups and organization have classified same-sex relationship as entirely personal matter. In the feminist study groups that one of her clients attended, members frequently applied double standards when it came to matters related to homosexuality. They consider her clients intimate life with her partner to be strictly private, whereas the stories of heterosexual couples, either in private or as represented in the media, were considered normal and familiar. The distinction between the private public as the author argues is still rooted in the heterosexual system, while this distinction in the minds of lesbian and other sexual minorities still generate a fantasy of a safe space. This incident tests the feminist ambivalence towards lesbian exposure of sexual orientation. As was the case with girls who sold counseling with the author, most feminist encouraged lesbian colleagues to come out, however, once their identities are revealed, feminist often begin applying different rules to force lesbian colleagues to remain silent. The project teams plan of having a separate exhibition at La Vizimar, making the name Lesbian Conspicuous in the context working festival, in this context become more controversial. And then I moved to the actual exhibition, and especially contrasting its own project L-teams exhibition, along with some of the dominant posts of feminist curatorialism in Korea. Almost nine months after its conflicts with the working festival, the exhibition Project L finally opened in June 2005 at the gallery escape, located in the Hong Kong University area. The number of participating artists had increased from 5 to 10 during that period. The controversy related to Project L did not attract significant attention in the artwork, partly due to some lesbian artists' fear of exposure to critics and other feminist artists. The overall consensus within the exhibition team was not to seek out for media attention, other than articles published in feminist-related magazines, as might bring earth-versaurea effects on artists who have been active in other collaborative projects and group shows in Korea. At first, those in the artwork might appear to have more open-minded attitude toward the queer theories and gender ambiguity compared to some of the feminist activists in the working festival committee. As the 1990s progressed, the feminist curators and artists came to take critical stances toward the character woman herself, mostly influenced by Foucault's critique of knowledge as a means of classifying and controlling individuals as a deminfarer perverse and potentially dangerous by established institutions of government, culture, medical practice, and so on. For instance, Hong He Kim, the organizer of three major feminist exhibitions in Korea, Women, Their Difference and Power in 1994, and the second exhibition is Parade of Padji, 1999, and most recently on these back in 2008. Challenge a restrictive definition of women. So this is the first exhibition. There is a women's art, and in some of the exhibitions, the women's art in Korea before the 1990s, but oftentimes some of the women's art in the 1990s is much more focused on the social inequity drawing out of the Marxist tradition. This is the first exhibition that might more focus on the gender issue, and as you can see, you can see more like influence of Judy Chicago type of artworks. But I want to highlight some of the shifting conditions and approach during the Parade of Padji, 1999. This is the exhibition where there's a quote coming from, and this is a Suja Kim's work, also included in the 1999 exhibition. In Sex and Gender section, she wrote for the 1999 exhibition, the Parade of Padji, Kim the creator contrasts the concept gender and sex. They knew feminist critics and artists, embracing semiotic psychoanalysis to constructionist theory, focus on the fact that the notion of femininity is also socially and historically determined. Before they choose the method of performance, simulacra, myth, and Parade as a way of redefining female sexuality, highlighting the concept of gender over biological sex. Kim's interpretation of recent developments in feminist arts in Korea was of particular importance beginning in the mid-1990s among feminist artisan scholars. First, a socially constructive use of gender marriage with a post-colonialist debate to position or reposition avant-garde practice by Korean female artists in relation to international avant-garde, Western feminism, and stereotypical images of Asian women. Suja Kim in Bully, two prominent feminist artists in Korea who also appeared in Kim's Sex and Gender section, have pursued self-images or female images that overcome gender, as well as a culture of boundaries. Issaib or recovered with a sleek and ethereal armor defies the stereotypical images of the passive, obedient, oriental women who have challenged the distinction between Eastern and Western cultures, the colonizer and colonizer. And this figure has also very much robotics, so it's on the one hand impenetratable, but at the same time you can see the very sexual the appearances, as well as some of the side-book images in relation to comic books. The comic books are ready, self is very hybrid, the culture forms. Second, so the whole discussion actually opened not just about the femininity, but also the different issues of culture distinction and Eastern West and the future of present and machine-hand human being. Second and more importantly, for discussion of gender ambiguity, the category of femininity or women as the major target of criticism brought a new recognition of inconsistent relationship between the biological traits of the body and the categorical distinction of identity, at least within the context of our museum. Ji Hyun Kim's video work, Yeo Jang Gong Saek, is composed in 1999, is composed of 60 modern images that include not only biologically female bodies, but also transgender bodies and bodies of drag queens. The images include a female body that retains the remnants of thick, manly and lengthy body hair of drag queens. Despite the more self-escape rate of exclineating the relationship among the body, identity, and the self, the influence queer theory and its skeptical approach toward identity remains, especially from the perspective of self-proclaimed lesbians and the local to identity politics. On the one hand, queer theory combined with the category of homosexuality with gender, ethnicity, race, and class, acknowledging multiple aspects of individual identity. On the other hand, undermined the traditional notion of identity could present the danger of ignoring the rear and persistent prejudice and homophobia that the female homosexual and bisexual must deal with. The issue of identity was one of the major concerns among the members of the project. This is the catalogue of Unneeds Back, the survey exhibition in 2008. The issue of identity was one of the major concerns among the members of Project L. This is the first question of who and what we lesbians are in this society today. By avoiding one fixed lesbian identity, we attempt to revisit and support our changing faces and struggles in order to survive and get the power we deserve. According to the author of the introduction, lesbian identities exemplify a complicating notion rather than undermining the close relationship between the self and identity altogether. We acknowledge that the one standard answer regarding lesbian identity is difficult, if not impossible, the author notes, but diverse lesbian representation can partly point to the answer to lesbian identity. Their critical voice sounds less analytic than affirmative as the exhibition intended to bring attention to women artists dealing with the theme of same sex, desire and fighting against consistent denier of female homosexuals in Korea, abided within various theoretical frameworks. In place of vague notion of queer identity, the section of the exhibition called the Lesbian Sexuality Identity was designed to show artists who hoped to locate themselves within a single category. E means L in, that means L people. This plays various women such as lesbian activists and transgender women living in the Netherlands. They're all called L in, as though the term denotes a citizenship of which they are all super proud of. Despite their diverse geographical locations and physical differences, they're all united under one name, lesbian people. Throughout the exhibition, artists took the duo approaches of advocating a powerful image of lesbians of portraying their socially alienated marginalized conditions. In the video projection L in Wonderland by the artist Metang after following the rabbit, Alice becomes equipped with a kind of gator a slang term for ability to recognize other homosexual or homosexual cultures. Quote Once you find a watch of rabbit, your adventure begins, simple things hiding in just cartoons, just drama, just advertisement, gradually appear and you begin to recognize them. Quote This work touches upon the epistemological concern related to recognizing a usually overlooked lesbian sensibility within the normal environment. Simultaneously older things certainly take a new career meaning. For instance close female bonds among the royal women of Joseon dynasty as you can see the women for the traditional wardrobe as affectionately portrayed in the drama. All the sisterhoods share among schoolgirls in comic books. Alice's experience in the Wonderland Harbour also reminds the viewer of emotional insecurity that many of you have seen. The audience is invited to identify with Alice who do not not only proceeds with alternative readings of homosexual culture but also enters a state of confusion self-alienation and resistance and this is the last work. Nobody teaches me sexual education, self-terse, self-education a work composed of serious shots of two women enjoying their women's intimacy captivating as she showcased the image of two young females literally caressing each other images of the drag queens dominated most of artworks dealing with homosexual in Korea whereas the image of actual lesbians engaged in sexual intimacy are rare. The shot of female couple confronts the viewer defying their society's efforts to deny the presence of lesbian couples. The voice of the artist is also captivating. Artist's story goes back to the time when she actually fainted out at schools with her recognition and name of a desire quote, there is nowhere that one finds sex education for girls and girls or for her and her the text reads, it might be too late but maybe not, my pathetic sex education accompanying text and artist statement published in the catalog and posted on the exhibition helped the audience to ponder few questions that the non-homosexual audience is worth posing. The history project Elton provides us with the clues regarding the difficult circumstances which lesbian artists have found themselves within feminist organization as well as the context of feminist art in Korea. So here I will go back to the author of the article that I mentioned before according to who also serve as a council of lesbian research organization in Korea, according to people who refuse to discuss homosexual in public that essentially saying quote, I don't personally mind homosexuality but if they are coming out of social decorum then their acts of coming out should be reconsidered. This obscure and detour way of saying no to homosexual in Korea corresponds to the dynamics between what has been said and unsaid as Fuku has pointed out both working festival committee and the feminist curators in Korea have decided ways of detaching themselves from discourses about female homosexuality without directly exposing their discomfort or with lack of understanding about women with sexual desire. Before presenting the image of L people L in the quote, these ominous women exist everywhere to paraphrase description in the catalogue has a significant meaning to fight against the state of silence that is the strategy taken by mainstream society particularly by some feminist activists and artwork to deliberately undermine the presence of lesbian arts in Korea. Thank you.