Made in North Korea (Kaesong Industrial Complex), 2010 / 2019 The Made in North Korea collection was designed by Dirk Fleischmann and manufactured at the Kaesong Industrial Complex in 2010. The Kaesong Industrial Complex was an inter-Korean joint venture, where South Korean companies were able to operate inside North Korea, and employ North Korean laborers. The project includes more than one thousand newspaper articles about the Kaesong Industrial Complex, which provide a wide range of perspectives on this special economic zone. It reflects controversies and efforts towards reconciliation in the relationship between both Koreas.
Dirk Fleischmann’s art projects relate to economic issues and take place over many years. His projects have taken the form of a diversified business enterprise: kiosks, trailer rental, chicken egg production, solar energy, a game show, chandelier manufacturing, virtual real estate, reforestation and a fashion label.
Using business models as strategies to explore ostensibly well-known economic forms, Fleischmann inhabits these forms and participates in the same field as other corporations do. His quasi-entrepreneurial activities are experimental, fully functioning micro-models which confront commercial mega-structures in a playful but critical way. His strategy is to create and present alternative conditions of service, trade or production as an attempt to regain with provisional means, at least for a short while, societal fields that seem to be completely occupied by conglomerates.
Dirk Fleischmann (*1974), is based in Berlin and Seoul, where he teaches Fine Art at Chung-Ang University. He completed his studies at the Städelschule art academy in 2002. In 2014 he founded RAT school of ART in Seoul. His work has been recently shown at, Media City Seoul Biennale (2018), Goethe Institut Belgrade (2018), Cheongju Craft Biennale (2017), Moderna Museet, Stockholm and Centre Pompidou – Metz (both 2016). Previous exhibitions include Sharjah Art Foundation (UAE) Steirischer Herbst (Graz), Gwangju Design Biennale, Kunstverein Hannover, Leeum Museum (Seoul), Hebbel am Ufer, HAU 1 (Berlin), Museum of Modern Art Busan, Musée d’Art Contemporain de Lyon, Museum Folkwang (Essen), Manifesta 4 (Frankfurt a.M.)