• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.118-134
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• 2013

This paper analyzes the pubic nature of New Genre Public Arts. It is very sensitive to the social issues and supports democracy and communities with the diverse civic participation. Therefore, it is be widely known without doubt that new genre public arts is more public in nature compared to the previous public arts. This research observes the practices of new genre public art and focuses on the problems of the revealing nature of new genre public art through the analysis of the interrelations among government, artists, and the residents by through observation on the , Seoul City Gallery project from October 2008 to January 2009. The implementation of the project is divided into three constituent parts: local government for funding, artists for planning and implementing, and residents. Local government supports and commands the public art works to create more competitive and harmonious city. Artists emphasize the revitalization of community and take the residents as the passive objects of enlightenment. Whereas, the residents hope to use the funds to improve economic conditions. Artists accept the top-down commands of government, whereas residents tend to passively participate and become objects for enlightenment by artists, after all, might be alienated by the project. These kinds of communications and relationships raise the issue of the possibility of failure of public arts projects.