SEJONG CENTER

Starting with "Spiritual Ecstasy", EASThug has long been paying attention to the interdisciplinary nature of Gut, the core culture of Korean shamanism, and has carried out various works that cross the stage and exhibition space, such as "Spirit Awaits" and "Spirits Untangled". Their works contain the ‘essence of Gut’ that wishes for the healing of the audience and society through media art and music, which is why Easthug's work is called Gut despite the absence of traditional devices such as colorful shaman costumes, straw cutter and shamans on stage.

Their work has been divided into two main branches: the Spirit Series, which incorporates a scientific approach that interprets the shaman's ‘spirit possession’ as a change in brainwaves, and expresses the brainwaves of the performers and audience as video-based contemporary media art; and the "Spirit Awaits" and 64ksana Bandset Composition Series, which focuses on the presence of the God and takes the performative elements of Gut music, combines them with electronic music, and expresses them as light and media art.

If the reason for performing Gut is healing and recovery through communication with the divine, the hall of Gut, where the invisible divine descends to earth, is a space where we can directly or indirectly experience the sacred rituals of Gut and the presence of the Godhead. In reality, however, the place where the Gut takes place is not a specially constructed space, but a very ordinary space - a room in a house, a yard, etc. These everyday spaces are transformed into sacred spaces through ritualized processes, and become virtual stages on which the gods descend. Underlying this process is the premise of ‘opening the door to welcome the gods’. "Edge of Sacred" in Jeju Gut expresses this opening of the gate.

EASThug's "Edge of Sacred", which will be presented for the first time at Sync Next 24 this year, focuses on this very space and reinterprets the appearance of the hall of Gut through LED-based media art. When the gates are opened, the gods are able to descend, and the divine and human realms are able to communicate with each other as an open space. At this moment, the universe becomes a unified world, so the opening of the gate is the starting point for communication with the divine.