I never thought I would find myself saying that the best thing at an event was the K-pop videos, but there’s a first time for everything. Let’s rephrase that. The K-pop videos were the most understandable items in the event, and they were also enjoyable: what’s not to like about good-looking performers showing off their moves in a song that’s tuneful and not too loud? So, a room which was showing BTS’s Permission to Dance held my attention, as did a curtained-off cubicle which had a girl band video. Elsewhere though I needed a bit of help to understand what was going on.
In one room, a long wall had video art being projected onto it – one moment it looked like slowly-animated pop art, the next moment there were images of antique wooden cabinets floating through a forest of dissolving trees.
In other rooms there were screens showing NFT artworks and videos of Extraordinary Attorney Woo in various stages of reality (in one video she appeared as a highly pixellated Lego character). In front of one screen a visitor was breaking some impressive dance moves, which mimicked the moves of a performer on the screen – or maybe it was the other way round.
The Oulim is definitely for people who are comfortable with VR headsets and are eager to try new things. I bumped into a young-at-heart senior university lecturer who was enthusing about one of the VR experiences she had tried, but I turned away for a moment and when I wanted to ask her which experience she would recommend, she had vanished. I think she was real. I bumped into another senior university lecturer who opined with certainty “my students would love this!”.
For people who are less brave, though, there really needed to be a hand-holding guided tour to tell you what it was all about, and what would happen to you if you dared to put on one of those headsets. It was only once I got home, for example, that I realised (on reading the accompanying 60-page brochure) that the girl band in the video I’d watched was a completely computer-generated one called Eternity. Very clever and convincing. And also that the BTS video used special technology to enhance the live concert experience across the three screens (and that if I’d waited for the video to repeat I’d also have seen ON and Dynamite).
I must go back to experience it all again when I’m feeling braver.
The Oulim in London is on at the Saatchi Gallery until 5 November.