Emil Goh's cyworld photography

Wednesday, 11 October 2006

Emil Goh says: I have been photographing cyworld users in their minirooms & offline spaces.

And next week I will show a work done in my "officetel" (office-hotel=a korean type of dwelling for mixed use), mirroring my miniroom.

My main reasons for doing this work is a fascination of how much young Koreans live online plus the variety of accommodation types that exist in this city (from regular 3-4 bedroom family apart).

Emil Goh moves seemingly effortlessly between countries and cultures. Malaysian born of Chinese descent, brought up and educated in Australia (and Goldsmith’s College in London) and now for the time being settled in Seoul, he manages to melt in pretty well almost anywhere. The place he stays in also provides his working material. His works are entirely about urban phenomena – lovers dressing codes for instance, or the Umbrella Taxi service he provided for pedestrians in a downtown area in Seoul.

His currently most ambitious project is on the particular Internet culture in Korea relating to the “Cyworlds” that are created on a number of web-pages. Here young (and not-so-young) Koreans create their own Internet blogs, where they establish alternative personas and homes, complete with wallpapers and interior decorations. Much of the energy in Emil Goh’s work comes from his ability to become part of the phenomena he describes, not as a spy or observer, but as a participant and social chameleon.