Inhabitants is a moving image installation inspired by the myth of Dongbangsak, a legendary immortal, associated with the River Tancheon that is the stream that flows across Seongnam-si, South Korea. The story tells, with a touch of humor, how Dongbangsak was eventually captured by a messenger of the underworld(a grim reaper) due to his curiosity and mistake, and taken to the afterlife.

Living in a contemporary world where different dimensions of reality are rapidly changing, I newly wove together somewhat fragmented questions I face and this local myth that traverses life and death, materiality and immateriality. The work addresses questions about tangible materials and digitized entities, the boundaries between them, life and death beyond the physical world, the persistence of knowledge and information, the contemporary value of reinterpreting local myths, and my personal connection to local craft traditions.

Drawing inspiration from an ancestral lamp artefact made by twisting technique with paper, once a common material in everyday life, I chose to twist plastic vinyl, a material easily found in our daily lives, to make this work. Through this process, I reflect on and critique the entanglement of plastic in contemporary society, while questioning what kind of material culture we should make for the future.