On the occasion of the publication of Ingo Niermann’s book Solution 264 – 274: Drill Nation (2015) as part of the REAL DMZ PROJECT 2015, Kyong Park (Professor, Visual Arts Department, University of California, San Diego) and the author discuss scenarios for a reunited Korea that test our common understanding of nation, affluence, fashion, health, and love. The two speakers each read their texts on the subject of a unified Korea, and compare the two different perspectives upon matters of unification.

Ingo Niermann
Born in 1969 in Germany, Ingo Niermann is a writer and the editor of the book series Solution. His debut novel Der Effekt was published in 2001. Recent books include Solution 264-274: Drill Nation (2015), Concentration (ed., 2015), Solution 247–261: Love (ed., 2013), Choose Drill (2011), The Future of Art: A Manual (2011), Solution 186–195: Dubai Democracy (2010), Solution 1–10: Umbauland (2009), Solution 9: The Great Pyramid (with Jens Thiel, 2008), and The Curious World of Drugs and Their Friends (with Adriano Sack, 2008). Niermann co-founded the revolutionary collective Redesigndeutschland, and invented a tomb for all people, the Great Pyramid. Together with Rem Koolhaas he has been building a tool for public ballots—Vote—in Gwangju, Korea. In cooperation with Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Berlin), Niermann started the international digital publishing project Fiktion.

Kyong Park
Kyong Park is professor of Public Culture at University of California, San Diego (since 2007), the founding director of StoreFront for Art and Architecture in New York (1982-1998), International Center for Urban Ecology in Detroit (1998-2001), and Centrala Foundation for Future Cities in Rotterdam (2005-2006), a curator of the Gwangju Biennale (1997), and Artistic Director and Chief Curator of Anyang Public Art Project 2010 in Korea. He has exhibited in Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Castilla y León (Spain), Kunsthalle (Graz), Deichtorhallen (Hamburg), Kunst Werke (Berlin), and Nam June Paik Art Center (Seoul), and authored Urban Ecology: Detroit and Beyond (2005). His current project is “Imagining New Eurasia,” research-based exhibitions to visualize the continental and urban structure of the continent, while exploring new and historical connections and relations between East and West, and in between, commissioned by Asian Cultural Complex in Gwangju.