North Korean Art

There are a few feeds I subscribe to that I almost never read; they’re just there for when I’m stuck on a boring con call or I’m really tired late at night. One of them is North Korea Zone; I have a sick fascination with North Korea, the fact such a place can still exist in the 21st Century is mind-boggling. Anyhow, late last night I ran across some online North Korean Art, which I entirely lack words to describe. To get warmed up, check out these Film Posters. Then there are shots of Kim Il-Sung with children and burning books and documents. Finally, I’m not sure why this one of Kim Jeong-Sook (whom I assume is the same person as Kim Jong-Suk) appealed to me, but it did. [Update: Some of the captions, translated, worth reading.]

문성익/John Simon writes:

Since I'm a Korean (fortunately a southern one), I thought maybe I could give you some mostly useless tidbits... more verbose translation of the captions in:

http://northkorea-art.com/images/socialistrealism/pp149.jpg “Don't worry about the construction” (I guess it's one of the “worker's blitzkrieg” propaganda movie.)

http://northkorea-art.com/images/socialistrealism/pp153.jpg Upper caption: “The People's Laurate Winner”. Title: “Revolution Musical: True daughter of the Party”

http://northkorea-art.com/images/socialistrealism/fp119.jpg “Field of Love”; it’s the same as http://northkorea-art.com/images/socialistrealism/fp137.jpg.

Also, translations of the captions in other pictures are too brief...

http://www.dprkstudies.org/documents/nkpics/1pg118.html says: “Dear sovereign Kim Il-Sung visits our kindergarten”.

http://www.dprkstudies.org/documents/nkpics/1pg042.html: “Dear sovereign and companion Kim il-sung burns the packages of Min-Saeng-Dan”. Min-Saeng-Dan was one of the puppet organization of Imperial Japan made to find out chosun (old Korea) freedom fighters.

Now it gets better. the caption in http://www.dprkstudies.org/documents/nkpics/2pg041b.html literally says: “Companion Kim Jong-Suk bravely BEATS THE HELL OUT of a damn punitive soldier” (yes it's the same Kim Jong-Suk). Really. the verb reads “ka-nu-pi-da”, which is vulgar and stronger version of the verb “nu-pi-da” (to beat one down).

Who says communists are boring? ;-)

Thanks!