[The Editors' Verdict] Beautiful Person, The One Behind Kim Min-ki

Kim Min-ki, born in 1951 and the representative of the theater company Hakjeon, has passed away. Like entrusting himself to his representative work, the musical Subway Line 1, he left suddenly. His death came to our society with a somber atmosphere. Why did it touch even those without a special connection to him so deeply?

He did not know us, but we know him. How many people have never sung the song Morning Dew even once? And how many have found solace in life after watching the performances he produced in Daehangno? The fact that he has left feels like an emptiness that spreads among us. Although only a day has passed since the funeral on the 24th, the reason why the longing is already piling up is clear.

In an era lacking societal elders, his absence is even more regrettable. A person who suited an ordinary gray jumper and worn jeans. A figure whose awkward speech was more charming. The word that runs through his life is sincerity. Perhaps that is why the song Morning Dew, soaked in the sweat-scented streets of our society in the 1970s and 1980s, resonates more deeply.

Amid the acrid tear gas smoke, the flickering intense slogans, and the flood of flags, when Morning Dew echoed as a reverberation, that place became a space of silence connecting each other. It inspired the courage to join hands toward a better world. In the chaotic era of the 1980s, he was there on those streets. Not on a podium receiving enthusiastic cheers from countless citizens, but as one more citizen among us. He sat so plainly that even those sitting right next to him might not have known he was the person of Morning Dew.

Another word symbolizing him is "the back." Does it mean the role supporting behind the glamorous stage, the role of helping someone else shine? "I am the back, you all are the front." There was a reason behind this phrase he habitually said. He shied away from doing things that made himself stand out or stepping forward. Although he lived as a singer, he was a person who did not want to perform in front of the public. Even when he had to sing inevitably, he was more comfortable singing behind the stage, in a hidden place.

He aspired to live a life as "the back," but those with special ties to him were the "front" representing the era. Singers Yang Hee-eun and Kim Kwang-seok, and actors Seol Kyung-gu, Hwang Jung-min, and Jo Seung-woo... There are many stars who reached the top based on their connection with him. If culture and arts are compared to a great river, he was regarded as the source of that river.

On the 22nd, a funeral hall for the late singer Kim Min-ki (representative of the theater company Hakjeon) was set up at Seoul National University Funeral Hall in Jongno-gu, Seoul.

It is a universal human desire to want to use those solid connections in the cultural and artistic world as a background for success, but he did not live such a life. If he had known how to use the world, Hakjeon, which was like his soul, might never have closed due to financial difficulties. In a world where one must live weakly to survive, he was a stranger. A life that went against the times, which easily overturned its own principles for small gains. We have lost a precious elder named Kim Min-ki. But we still have the songs he left us.

"When dark rain falls, a child stands crying under the eaves. When raindrops gather in those clear eyes, hmm, that beautiful person is a human being."

The song "Beautiful Person" may be Kim Min-ki’s farewell and plea to us.