Director Kyung Sung Lee from Seoul opened the first panel of Saturday’s research atelier Our Common Futures. How can the artist’s work be understood as an intervention into society? His answer is simple, yet hopeful, indeed:

“We judge each other so quickly by one’s political opinion and we hate each other so quickly, so I wanted to kind of try to delay this process of judging each other by creating this space for conversations.”

In today’s difficult times Kyung Sung Lee offers another inspiring image and idea, when he says that in the space of a theater “we can still face each other”. Yes, there are conflicts and there are different opinions and political views and there is a lot of judgment in the first place, but what it really needs is communication and a dialogue instead.

Creating a space for those conversations through performing arts is the kind of intervention that makes me wanting to be a part of the arts and of our common future – “being apart, but together”.