The area around Yeongdeungpo Station is an odd mix of old and new. The main street is lined with major department stores and shops. But just behind the street stretches an overlooked side of Seoul.

One of the city’s few remaining red-light districts and a cluster of shanty houses known as “jjokbangchon” in Korean appear just a few meters from the crowded Shinsegae Department Store. The street toward Moonrae-dong west of Yeongdeungpo is lined with drab little ironworks and unfrequented stores, traces of a once-vibrant industrial town.

The area, long left without cultural facilities, has started to see cultural activities taking place recently. An audience of about 300 visited the neglected area on Nov. 20 to see an exhibition at Yeongdeungpo Common Center, one of the alternative art spaces in Seoul that opened last year.

The art center is far from a typical white cube gallery. The basement of the building is occupied by a homeless shelter. The walls reveal raw cement and clusters of black mold on torn wallpaper. Curators said that as the building is slightly tilted, setting up a temporary wall against one of the cement walls to hang a painting is a hard task.

“The center showcases exhibits and works that haven’t been shown in other places in Seoul,” said Hahm Young-june, director of the art space. Hahm found the four-story building, which had been vacant for several years, when he was looking for a space for a commissioned art exhibition. He rented the building to showcase experimental artworks by young emerging artists and let young curators with fresh ideas hold exhibitions.

“It houses artworks that don’t fit into clean white cube galleries.”

The ongoing exhibition, “The Young and the Restless,” curated by young curators Ahn Dae-woong and Choi Jeong-yoon, is in line with the center’s intent to host creative exhibitions. The exhibition explores the changing perceptions of youth from the 1990s to the present through artworks that have strong social and personal messages.

Five teams, each composed of an established artist and a young artist, present their views of youth through diverse works ranging from videos and installations to paintings.

“It’s about different generations of artists speaking about the youth of their time. Middle-aged artists had high hopes for their future when they were young in the 1990s. But today’s young artists paint a grim picture of their uncertain future,” said Ahn.

The old, abandoned building has become an interesting stage to showcase experimental installations by young artists.

Artist Beak Jung-ki installed an experimental device that generates energy from candlelight. The energy is used to turn on the light bulb in the next room and the radio that is heard by passersby from outside of the building. 

Concrete walls become a screen for video works by Jung Yeon-doo and Park Chan-kyong, or a large canvas for Lee Ja-hye, who filled entire walls of rooms with her cartoon drawings.

The first floor features an archive of artist Lee Wan’s collection of old newspaper articles, magazines and presidential accolades given to people, including Newsweek magazine’s cover on the death of President Park Chung-hee in 1979 and an old biography of his daughter, incumbent President Park Geun-hye.

The exhibition continues through Dec. 31. Yeongdeungpo Common Center is about a 10-minute walk from Yeongdeungpo Station toward Mullae-dong. For more information, call (070) 7715-8232 or visit commoncenter.kr.

By Lee Woo-young (wylee@heraldcorp.com)