시대적 전환과 포스트모더니즘 논쟁

Cultural Turn and Postmodernism Debate : the Korean Art Criticism from 1987 to 1993

This essay is concerned about a heated controversy about post modernism in South Korea from late 1980’s to early 1990’s. During this period, a huge and fundamental change began in every realm of the society, which had resulted from the end of the Cold War, the rise of consumerism, the liberalization of abolition of censorship of the culture. The controversy about postmodernism which was the most argumental and intensive dispute in the history of criticism in South Korea changed the whole basement of recognition of art in Korea, which meant the passage of the paradigm from grand narratives to multi-culturalism. Assuming that the controversy as the mirror of the era had been condensing complexity and contradiction in korean art world, I explore how different point of views divide on the basis of the conflicting political standpoints and how diverse understandings are possible in the name of the post modernism. On one side, there were Modernist critics who expected post modernism to succession of the modernism. On the other side, there were realist critics who believed postmodernism as the cultural logic of the post-capitalism era. And the last, there were third eye from abroad. Two Korean critics in America reminded us of the inevitable necessity of the third world identity. Through this long and winding road, Korean art world realized the systematic problem in Korean art history and started to consider the real after-modern in third world Korea.