Expat artists team up to extend murals around Mi Cook Oppa

Expat artists will descend on a street in Itaewon to add some color to the concrete.

Lawrence Blackman of art group Look But Don’t Touch, said he met James Beckwith, the owner of Mi Cook Oppa in Itaewon, a few months ago when Beckwith led a similar event with another group. 

Now Beckwith has arranged for a new area to be painted, and Look But Don’t Touch is organizing the artistic side of things.

“His idea is to help develop the area by muralising it, which is something I completely agree with, and his space has really done that -- it has multiple large scale murals from international artists and is growing into an excellent space,” said Blackman.

“I very much believe in artists contributing to their environment, and this is a great way to do that, and also give artists the chance to paint murals (graffiti still being somewhat misunderstood in Korea).”

Artists from Busan-based groupExotic Beasts will also be joining the mural painting.

Look But Don’t Touch was started earlier this year with an art tour of four cities. More recently, it held “Curio,” a performance and visual art event that featured displays by Blackman, Henri Adamson and Martin Fetter, with performances by Ben Miller, Cindi L’Abbe and Loz T.

Creators of self-published books including Larv & Miv also displayed work at Curio.

Exotic Beasts artists, as well as Blackman, Adamson, Fetter and Miller will all be displaying work on the walls of Mi Cook Oppa, while music will also come from local indie group Nice Legs. 

The Paint Jam will run July 23 from 2 p.m. at Mi Kook Oppa. For more information see the Itaewon Graffiti Paint Jam Facebook page.

(paulkerry@heraldcorp.com)