Gwangju’s Asia Culture Center celebrates first year

As the Asia Culture Center (ACC) in Gwangju celebrates its first anniversary on Nov. 25, it has planned a host of cultural programs.

They include “Golden Age,” a dance performance to be held from Nov. 18 to 19, the Asia Story workshop, which will take place from Nov. 28 to Dec. 1 and “Club Monster,” an art exhibition that is inspired by contemporary music to be held from Nov. 23 to Feb. 26, 2017.

The ACC was founded a year ago to much controversy. For starters, its location, far away from Seoul, would prevent it from becoming the Asian epicenter that it seeks to be, critics argued. That the government poured in a whopping 800 billion won ($663 million) of taxpayer money into the facility added to the scrutiny.

ACC President Bang Sun-gyu told reporters on Thursday that the center is not just a venue for art exhibitions and musical performances, but rather a place where original plays and other art is produced as well as a research center that studies and archives the creative content of Asia.

“Currently about 19 performances that we’ve produced are touring 145 countries,” Bang said. “Producing cultural content and exporting it is one of our foremost tasks.” He added that many of the cultural events that ACC produces cross genres and make use of technology. He also said that although there is a research center in Hong Kong that is dedicated to studying and archiving the visual art of Asia, there is no such institution for all types of creative content from Asia, saying that if ACC continues to strengthens its research function, in the future it will be a place that world researchers refer to.

BY KIM HYUNG-EUN [hkim@joongang.co.kr]