Storm drain street art, Seoul South Korea

One of the nice things about simply wandering on foot in random directions is that you never know what you’ll find.  (That’s also one of the bad things about wandering around on foot in random directions but that’s for another post.)

During one of my first day treks in Seoul I found myself walking along the Han river.  I was in search of the bridges featured in the excellent South Korean movie “The host”.  It was while I was walking along the Han river pathway that I saw from a distance a large piece of graffiti, which you can see to the right.  This piece although not particular interesting to my eye was &*^%@# huge.  As I got closer to the area it was clear that there was no way to get into the entrance of the storm drain without going around a small fence.

I walked around the fence in the mud while getting my camera out of my bag. I had never seen such a large storm drain in person. I had seem some on television but it was my first time wandering in/near one and it was spooky.  Not to mention that laying near the entrance was a large handmade spear that looked it could be used to hunt some large subterranean monstrosity.  I wish I had snapped a picture from further back so you get a sense of how immense this storm drain was but nonetheless to give you an idea:

Most of the art was located at the entrance of the storm drain and it consistent mostly of some spray painted stencils, some ‘wheat paste’ pieces and some graffiti tags and slogans.

I’ll start off with some of the wheat paste (ie glue) pieces.  I’m not doing them justice by saying they were quite large.  You can scroll down to the bottom of the page for a pic that attempts to put the size of these pieces in perspective.  To give you an idea, there’s a picture where you see my left hand.  I was actually standing on the end of my toes in order to hold it up.

Rock, paper, scissors bitches!  Some things are universal and there’s nothing that can’t be decided by RPS.  The little ants you see were stenciled all over the area.  Again to try to explain the scale of these pieces, the ants were about the size of my hand…

I can’t help but wonder if the speaker was actually hooked up to a sound system the night of the party.  I get the impression that this was probably some local art troupe of university gang that got together, partied and “painted”.

I liked how in the picture below one of the arms is continued on the angled wall.  I always enjoying seeing street artist “bend” their pieces around corners or on some other surface.   Most people know how hard it is to draw a hand.  If you don’t try to draw yours for fun.

Here’s a large collage that was pasted onto one of the walls.  I’ve separated a few pieces of the collage below.  Once more to get a good idea of the scale of the pieces you can see the same collage next to other pieces in a picture taken from a different perspective

Here we have a few quick pieces by Clesh and I think Bisok?  I had a chance to read an interview online with Clesh.  He explained himself that he wasn’t necessarily the most talented ex-pat artist in Seoul but that he was “up” (he had written his name) enough to be recognized.  In my few months in Seoul I encountered several of his tags around town.

Finally a couple of last pieces and the “evidence” that was left behind.  Some of the tools of the trade; paint, gloves and rollers.

As mentioned at the start, most of the wheat paste pieces were huge (life size).  I think this picture gives you an idea of the just how big these pieces actually were.  That wheat paste that you see to the left was my height.

Finally I’ll leave you with my favorite piece from the storm drain.   It’s not the most beautiful piece but the message struck a cord with me:

I’m making a point to wrap up all the post from my Korean and Japan trip in the next few weeks, so stay tuned for more.

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