In 1992, Koo moved from Daegu to Seoul to attend photography graduate school. Whilst on a budget, Koo used an old German camera model, the Zeiss Ikon, to capture the streets of the city. From 1993 to 1998, Koo clicked his shutters in every nook and cranny of Seoul, observing its streets and people. Selected photos from his 5-year collection made up his first solo exhibition “Living in Seoul.” In the series, a man stoically looks into the camera amongst a protesting crowd and a woman stands with an unreadable expression in front of trash-ridden Seoul Station. The powerful stares of the black and white faces may cause you to uncomfortably shuffle your feet, but you won’t be able to look away. A heavy and tired air hangs in every photograph that speaks powerfully about the turbulent violence and onerous weight Seoul carried during Koo’s days. Tensions that plagued the time are almost tangible inside the square frames that show a woman sitting in the back seat of a bus turned facing the window and a middle-aged man leaning against the sign of a subway station and smoking. In a place riddled with uncertainties and sorrow, what did it mean for these people to live in Seoul?
