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Icons of Rhetoric – a different approach to documenting North Korea, at Doomed Gallery

This month starts with an exhibition of oil paintings by established DPRK artists, to be held in the DPRK Embassy. With serendipitous timing, another exhibition offering a very different perspective, in Dalston, 20-23 November:

Icons of Rhetoric

Chris Barrett, photographer, and Gianluca Spezza, researcher/writer
20 – 23 November 2014
Doomed Gallery | 65-67 Ridley Road | Dalston | London E8 2NP | www.doomedgallery.com
Thurs: 6 – 9pm, Fri: 4-8pm, Sat: 1-8, Sun: 1-7

ICONS OF RHETORIC | 북한의 수사학 아이콘
ICONS OF RHETORIC | 북한의 수사학 아이콘
Photo: Chris Barrett

Images and text that offer a different approach to documenting North Korea.

Under Kim Jong Un’s rule, North Korea has made a conscious decision to be more proactive in the media world. It has increased the number of programs and broadcastings, it has ventured into the IT market, producing tablets and OS; furthermore, its officials have given interviews to mainstream media both in the UK and US and in 2013 we have seen the very first live tweeted image of a North Korean leader by Sky News. Icons of Rhetoric portrays and analyzes these developments adding to the work of specialists such as BR Myers, David Shim, Heonik Kwon and Sonia Ryang, to gain a better understanding of the DPRK in this increased time of visual content and media activity in the much cited but much misunderstood ‘most close off country in the world’.

Icons of Rhetoric offers a unique, introspective look at North Korea, crafted using North Korean news footage, a smartphone, Impossible instant film and North Korean testimonies.

The project investigates the visual representation of North Korea and the contextualisation of media images; exploring the visual lexicon which permeates the often cited ‘most isolated country in the world’: North Korea.

The exhibition will see the launch of a zine containing images and text from the work in partnership with thephotocopyclub.com

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