I’m glad to introduce Mullae-dong, “art district” in South Korea. It was originally a huge industrial district has many factories-especially making steel, ironware. In middle of 1990s, many factories moved or closed(due to depression) and there started to be built many apartments. Artists have moved Mullae-dong since 2000, because of rent fee is much lower than any other place in Seoul. Korea is very small, Seoul, the capital of Korea is especially has high land prices. This likes Japan, Tokyo. And in many cases show(for example, Tate modern gallery district in UK), the industrial districts with old factories very match modern-contemporary emotion so many artists (including architects), like create their studio in a factory.

So, the studios increase from 15~30 (in 2003~2006) to 50 after 2 years, there are not only fine arts, includes all kind of visual art likes illustration or design, performing art, fusion Korean classical music etc. With increasing art studios, Mullae-dong is naturally known of an “art district” to many people, finally there were held Mullae International Arts Festival(MIAF) in 2009.

In 2010, “Mullae Art Factory”(transits directly; in English they named Seoul art space_Mullae) opened on Jan 28. It means that Mullae-dong art ditrict, so called “Mullae Arts Creating Village”, is acknowledged by people and government clearly. It does not complete, however, it is ongoing now. The government planed that make it being a famous art district so let many people move to there and develop regional economy.



P.S. Unfortunately, there are few information in English.

District information in Wiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mullae-dong

Seoul art space_Mullae
http://www.seoulartspace.or.kr/eng/about/munrae.asp

MIAF
http://www.miaf.co.kr/