Kililheun cheolsae

There's an island near us called Eulsukdo, or rather 'Eulsuk Island' since 'do' means island in Korean. In the sense that there's an area of space there that has not been built on, but rather set aside for leisure purposes, parts of the island pass for a park, though there isn't as much greenery as you might imagine.

We've been there a few times since I came to Busan but last time I discovered an area designated as a 'sculpture park', and the sculptures within it all seemed fairly innocuous until I encountered a piece entitled 'Migrant Worker'. Unfortunately the photos I took weren't very good because it was twilight. Between illness and being kept busy with other things it's taken me a long time to get back there, but I finally made it back today - so here I present to you 'Migrant Worker':

Personally, I was struck by the dark almost non-human features and the general unkempt demeanour right down to the open fly in the migrant worker's trousers. The artist is from China, and as I understand it, despite its location in Korea this is more of an internal Chinese commentary than anything else. But like all art, I suppose you have to draw your own conclusions about what it all means.

Korean tags: 이주, 노동