A group of passionate Korean American women are putting together a groundbreaking production of The Vagina Monologues, written by playwright/activist Eve Ensler.
The play, which addresses woman’s sexuality and the social stigma surround rape and abuse, has been credited for creating a new conversation about and with women. This particular performance will incorporate Korean language and traditional drumming for several pieces, making it the first Vagina Monologues show to ever be performed by an all-Korean cast in New York. Following each performance, photographer Gil Seo will feature work from a recent V-Day campaign photoshoot, and visual artist Chang-Jin Lee will exhibit her work on comfort women.
The play is being put on by a division of V-Day, a global activist movement that aims to end violence against women by raising funds and awareness through benefit productions of The Vagina Monologues and other artistic works. V-Day New York City, Koreatown 2011, will benefit KAFSC (Korean American Family Service Center), an organization that promotes safe, healthy and respectful relationships amidst the Korean American community. KAFSC also provides assistance for the needs of sexual assault and rape victims, and holds campaigns to promote violence prevention.
We spoke with Elena Chang (you may recognize her from one of the finalist videos from our Krazy Kpop contest back in November) about V-Day and the upcoming performances, which will take place on Sunday, March 20, and Monday, March 21.
KoreAm: What inspired you personally to work with the V-Day campaign?
Elena: Much of my work has been dedicated to outreach and visibility for the Korean American community as both an actress and activist.
A few years back, I was involved in the short film “Wianbu”, which was featured in a festival the Korea Society sponsored. Wianbu was a short based on the history of comfort women in Korea. I was so inspired by some of these real-life stories of Korean women from that decade and was even more in shock by how many Korean-Americans in our community were not aware of such a massacre.
This led me to explore various issues concerning sexuality, domestic violence, and assault that many in our community are quiet about.
I found out about the V-day campaign last year when I became involved with a show myself, and asked myself why a production by and for Korean women has never been performed in NYC, especially when the silence around certain issues is so prevalent amongst us.
I was inspired to finally lead a production of all Korean women for 2-3 performances of this groundbreaking show, and immediately applied to Eve Ensler’s V-Day campaign about this.
KoreAm: How are you guys incorporating the Korean culture into the Vagina Monologues?
Elena: In our particular production we have an entirely Korean-American cast of actresses and activists from NYC. The word “vagina” is spoken over 100 times in the production, and we have chosen to incorporate particular Korean terms for “vagina”.
There will be a Poonmul solo by Liz Rhee, a leader in the Korean American cultural NYC troupe, BINARI.
In addition, one of the pieces we are performing will be “Say It”, which will be presented as a tribute, based on the testimonies of Comfort Women as they recounted the experiences of years of their childhood spent tortured and imprisoned in sexual slavery camps created by the Japanese Army.
Following our benefit, we have a post-show art exhibition where Korean visual artist Chang-Jin Lee will present some of her powerful work on Korean Comfort Women, as well as a photo exhibition of our V-Day Koreatown campaign by photographer Gil Seo.
KoreAm: What message do you want to send out to the Korean American community through V-Day?
Elena: Through the V-Day 2011 New York City, Koreatown Campaign, the production seeks to raise awareness about issues of domestic violence and sexuality in the Korean-American community, connecting these issues to wider systemic issues that affect communities all over the world. The term “vagina” has often been an immense source of shame and secrecy for many of Korean women because of tradition and assumptions of Korean femininity.
With V-Day: Koreatown, 2011, the team hopes to unlock some of this silence, and encourage audience members and the Korean community to empower women.
