Gwanak Cultural Foundation 2nd Anniversary Marks New Role for Basic Cultural Foundation

Discovering and Supporting Projects Turning Ordinary Life and Stories into Creative Materials and Art... Various Efforts to Provide Quality Cultural Enjoyment Opportunities Amid the Difficult Times of COVID-19

High School Popper

[Asia Economy Reporter Jong-il Park] Gwanak-gu (Mayor Park Jun-hee) celebrated the 2nd anniversary of the launch of the Gwanak Cultural Foundation (CEO Cha Min-tae), established to promote culture and arts under the vision of "Everyone's art shines as brilliant culture," on August 1.

Despite the challenging circumstances due to COVID-19 at the time of its launch, the foundation has been pioneering a new role for basic cultural foundations by promoting various projects based on the belief that "the most personal and local things can be the most creative."

Additionally, through the foundation, the district has laid the groundwork for cultural and artistic professionals, whose activities had frozen, to confidently showcase their talents without losing their dreams. This includes appointing the master of the cultural and arts world, theater actor Park Jeong-ja, as the foundation’s chairperson, accelerating the fulfillment of the pledge to build a "brilliant cultural city."

Since its inception, the district and the cultural foundation have focused on securing external funding from the central government, Seoul Metropolitan Government, and others to provide more residents with quality cultural enjoyment opportunities despite the difficulties caused by COVID-19, successfully attracting about 3.1 billion KRW.

This amount ranks among the top tier of basic foundations within Seoul, and has been used to develop various content that anyone can participate in during daily life, where non-face-to-face interactions have become the norm.

Representative examples include 'story in Gwanak,' featuring a splendid cast and staff, and 'Our Neighborhood Artists Live,' a new attempt to turn ordinary daily life into an artistic stage, starring ordinary neighbors and set against backgrounds such as Sharosugil, Gwanaksan Mountain, and Nakseongdae.

'Goryeo Avengers,' the nation’s number one Goryeo history education content that reexamines General Gang Gam-chan and Goryeo history, is a prime example of spreading local cultural resources nationwide. Within six months of being uploaded on YouTube, it surpassed 340,000 cumulative views and has been used as educational material on Goryeo history not only in 21 elementary schools in the region but also through an MOU with Naju Office of Education, being utilized in elementary schools under Naju city’s jurisdiction.

Moreover, the foundation successfully attracted broad citizen participation across various age groups, including youth, by planning and producing licensed performances of 'Anne of Green Gables' titled 'Green Wind in the Birch Forest' and the nationwide youth popping battle 'High School Popper.'

Meanwhile, the district is carrying out the remodeling project of Gwanak Art Hall this year with support of 1.5 billion KRW in Seoul city subsidies and 1.7 billion KRW in special grants. Through this, Gwanak Art Hall, the only public performance venue in the area, is expected to be reborn as a professional performance hall, playing a leading role in revitalizing the local economy alongside providing cultural benefits to local residents.

Park Jun-hee, Mayor of Gwanak-gu, said, "Since the establishment of the Gwanak Cultural Foundation, efforts have been underway both internally and externally to enhance our status as a cultural city and build diverse infrastructure in an organized manner. Especially this year, we will concentrate all our capabilities on being preliminarily selected as a cultural city by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, striving to ensure that not only artists but all Gwanak residents can enjoy cultural benefits."