100 PORTRAITS & DISAPPEARED BUT REMAINED
Curated by the Museum of Photography, Seoul, Disappeared But Remained excavates the idea of photography as a trace, or even a relic, of historical forces and aesthetic lexicons. Focusing on the work of three prominent Korean photographers – Woon-Gu Kang, Ki-Chan Kim and Gap-Chul Lee – the images oscillate from cutesy snaps of children and families to the stern documentation of increasingly rare rural scenes. It’s a riveting if incomplete keyhole into a fading Korea.
100 Portraits is what happens when collectivism meets creativity: a whittled down curation of over 1300 images from online photo sharing community FlakPhoto. The portraits are varied – a startling close-up of pillowy lips, vulnerable nudes, tattooed youths and a robed trio brandishing guns – and quite surprisingly invariably fascinating. However their impact is diminished by their presentation; you could almost blink and miss them when entering the gallery.
Until Aug 27, Australian Centre of Photography, 257 Oxford St, Paddington, 9332 1455, acp.org.au
