Silence Traces Water Beneath (2026)
at 2026 Busan Biennale Silence Traces Water Beneath (2026) grows out of long-term field research into Jeju Island’s groundwater and the sounds of its volcanic landscape. Rainwater seeps through layers of lava and underground caves before resurfacing as springs. Following these hidden waterways, the film moves across volcanic terrain and through landscapes transformed by military infrastructure and tourism development. These places carry traces of the Jeju April 3 massacres alongside the island’s ongoing ecological changes. Moving between the surface and what lies beneath, the work follows water and human bodies across different scales of time. As histories of violence become entangled with ecological change, the landscape emerges not merely as a backdrop but as a witness to what remains at the edges of political and cinematic visibility.
Departing from the desire to hear what cannot be heard, the installation unfolds through multiple screens and sound pieces dispersed across the exhibition space. Fragments of field research emerge as partial traces rather than a continuous narrative, allowing visitors to encounter the slow temporality of groundwater through shifting relations between images, sounds, and their own movements. Attending to memories and relationships that have yet to take clear form, the work explores the possibility of shared sensibility and care through worlds that briefly come into being.