[Bridging Cultures] Ask questions, Goethe-Institut director says

The arts are all about asking questions, even if the answers to everything are not presented all at once, according to the director of the Goethe-Institut Korea.

In a recent interview with The Korea Herald, Clemens Treter, director of the Goethe-Institut Korea, said his mission is to help open up space for such exploration -- a job he has been busy performing since he took the post in September 2022.

“We will also then get back to society and maybe influence and get other people to think,” Treter said of the power of dialogue, citing a project he initiated in March 2022.

At the inaugural meeting of “Lucky Supper Club,” two Korean women artists -- a cultural event planner and a pansori singer who performs traditional Korean narrative singing -- talked over dinner about dealing with the difficulties working mothers face.

“If you’re an artist and you don’t have childcare, what do you do?” Treter said of the discussion moderated by Son Hyun, an engineer-turned-writer, as guests offered their take on a problem Korea has been grappling with for some time.

The May meetup that focused on “debating in difficult times” marked one of the eight suppers scheduled for the year.

Immigration, Treter added, is another complex topic relevant to both Korea and Germany -- a country with “a lot of immigration” compared to Korea, which is “still quite not that open.”

Treter noted artists of different backgrounds render a richer German culture, acknowledging, however, that the shift accompanies the “complexities of the world” that are “not always easy to handle,” because they can spark tension.

“There’s no one answer,” Treter said. “It isn’t easy, but through the arts, you can also, as I said, take this kind of a more playful approach.”

According to Treter, Korea and Germany can expand exchanges especially in the performing arts, citing the May 10-12 showcase of the German play, “Everywoman,” by the theater company, Berlin Schaubuhne, at the National Theater of Korea.

The play by Swiss director Milo Rau questions the metaphysical meaning to life through a hospice patient -- the kind of soul-searching that can lead to communal catharsis.

Preparations are underway for a performance in September exploring the legacy of the late German choreographer Pina Bausch.

Lee Kyung-sung, director of the Seoul-based theater company, Creative VaQi, will enlist Korean and German dancers for the show that will be staged at the LG Arts Center in Seoul.

Treter, who also served as the director in Taipei and Beijing, described Korean artists’ approaches to art as advanced, which offers German artists “a lot of inspiration.”

Visual and media artist Kim A-young is one example, Treter recalled, whose exhibition at Gallery Hyundai in 2022 he visited.

“I was greatly inspired by her installation, ‘Syntax and Sorcery,’” Treter said. “(It) links virtual worlds with our reality and tells us a story we can feel close to and estranged from at the same time.”

This article is the fourth in a series of interviews with heads of foreign cultural centers at the forefront of cultural exchange. --Ed.