A protest demanding fair minimum wage is taking place. This is a scene from “Factory Lights” which is now being shown at Seoul 284, the old Seoul Station building. This production was also presented at the 16th Seoul Marginal Theater Festival.

Regardless of scarce public attention, the Seoul Marginal Theater Festival has been speaking out for the marginalized members of our society for the past 16 years.

With artistic and social visions, the Seoul Marginal Theater Festival attempts to tell various tales of socially marginalized people through the medium of theater play. Many barriers exist in this world, but we try to break them down, or at least make cracks in them, and share those experiences with the public. Through these plays we want to talk about the prejudices we have, voices of social outcasts, and the dimensions hidden from our view.



That was the festival’s artistic director Lim In-ja임인자 describing the festival’s purpose. The Seoul Marginal Theater Festival represents the opinions and views of those at society’s margin, such as laborers, the handicapped, the homeless, and school dropouts, through the cultural channel of theater play. Many of the productions shown at the festival are experimental. One such experimental method allowed the downtrodden to tell their own stories on stage. Here’s artistic director Lim In-ja again.

Ordinary plays center around the dramatic stories of characters, but fringe plays aim to raise questions and conduct experiments in how certain incidents are handled. Sometimes plays hire not only actors, but ordinary citizens or the main players from a certain incident to come up to the stage and tell their stories. This is what sets marginal theater apart from ordinary theater. This year we had laid-off laborers and bankrupt small businessmen in our cast. Also, drawings done by Ssangyong Motor and Kolon workers and the Hongik University maintenance crew were displayed in an exhibition and their stories were adapted into plays.

In the documentary play “Before the Law,” some of the fired workers and plaintiffs arguing the unconstitutionality of the business building lease protection law took to the stage themselves to discuss the meaning of law and justice seen from the minorities’ perspectives. Another production called “Camp, the Places of the Deceased” was a collaboration between Korea’s creative group Incomplete Project and Japan’s Olta Group, which showed the past and present labor conditions in Seoul’s industrial Garibong-dong neighborhood. Also, “Factory Lights” brought an actual labor protest to the stage and “Economy in Plays” spoke of structural ironies of the economy. All in all, 20 productions speaking on behalf of marginalized groups were presented to the public through theater plays, documentaries, and exhibitions.

The theme of this year’s Seoul Marginal Theater Festival was “Theater in the Square.” Instead of being staged in one confined area, it took place in various locations around Seoul, such as Gwanghwamun광화문 Plaza, Garibong-dong가리봉동, Seoul 286, City Hall auditorium, Hyehwa-dong혜화동, and a bookstore. The festival did not wait for people to come, but went to them instead. The opening piece was showcased at Gwanghwamun Plaza. Artistic director Lim In-ja is here to tell us more.

One-man protest or one-man performance tells how isolated our society has become. I think there aren’t enough mechanisms to discuss the values needed for each individual to live as a member of society. Instead, people are just voicing their individual opinions. There’s a play in the festival that wanted to first introduce individual voices and bring those 24 voices together at the end. The play wanted to show how isolated individuals could form solidarity through creative and artistic means and raise questions about how thoughts can change.

“25th Hour – An Outcry of My Generation” is a one-man protest carried out by 24 citizens and artists. For 24 hours from July 14 to 15, each person took turns to hold a one-man protest for an hour at Gwanghwamun Plaza. The participants came from all walks of life – an artist, a dancer, a politician, a human rights activist, a school dropout, a clergyman, a teenager, and many more. Among them were two masked women who live illegally on Nodeul노들 Island in the middle of the Han River. Here’s what one of those women told us about her life and the play.

We live on Nodeul Island, located near the Han River Bridge. We are living there illegally. This play for the Marginal Theater Festival is taking place in Gwanghwamun and we wanted our one-hour segment to show the illegal occupation of Gwanghwamun. We farm, sleep, and eat on Nodeul Island and our 24-hour daily life has been compressed into a one-hour performance.

The two women reenacted their daily routines at Gwanghwamun. It was only natural that the masked women’s eccentric behaviors drew people’s attention. They were peppered with questions from passers-by.

Ms. So and Ms. Mo, the occupiers of Nodeul Island, started setting the table as they answered people’s questions.

The two women invited three passers-by to sit with them for a meal. While they enjoyed bibimbap, conversations between the five of them continued.

Korean students study furiously throughout high school, expecting that life will be different when they enter college. But once in college they realize they have to get ready for the fiercely competitive job market. They are left with no breathing room. They take time off from school, fearing unemployment, but can’t take a break from their part-time jobs because they have to save money for tuition. Even after they finally find jobs, such issues as getting married, having a family, and buying a home loom ahead. This is the reality Korea’s young people face today. The occupiers of Nodeul Island brought attention to the plight of Korea’s younger generation by illegally residing on the island and told their own stories through their Gwanghwamun performance.
While “25 Hour” took real social outcasts like Ms. So and Ms. Mo out to the streets, “Factory Lights” brought a real protest to the stage.

The subtitle of “Factory Lights” is “Theater Assembly.” This is not the first time this play has been produced. It’s a new adaptation of “Factory Lights” originally written and directed by singer Kim Min-ki in 1978. Here’s director Kim Min-jung김민정 for this year’s production.

I saw a 37-minute video of the 1978 production of “Factory Lights.” It mainly provided information about how to stand up for workers’ rights by forming a labor union. Since it was 30 years ago, Kim Min-ki must have made the video to convince workers of the need for a union. Kim’s play was also comprised of songs recorded by artists and writers.

“Factory Lights” of 36 years ago talked about the need to found a labor union to protect workers’ rights, but the 2014 version presented what actually goes on at workplaces to support the workers. One of the incidents the protest-play addressed was the sudden layoff of maintenance workers at Hongik University in 2011.

Janitorial workers of Hongik University, who had demonstrated for more than 40 days back then, joined the “Factory Lights” production and added more meaning to the theater assembly. Here’s a representative of the laid-off janitorial crew to tell us more.

I represent the female janitors of Hongik University. I was moved to see how these actors made everything more real. Three years have passed already. I sometimes watch a video taken during our 49-day struggle to remind myself of our cause. Whenever we see that video we all end up crying.

Each time the protest is reenacted on stage, laid-off workers are encouraged and recharged. They are grateful that somebody out there is watching those on the fringe of society. Here’s one of the fired workers, Mr. Choi Il-bae최일배.

I’ve been protesting unfair layoffs for 10 years now. I am truly grateful. The hardest thing for protesters is realizing that they’re being forgotten and ignored. My portion of the play is titled “Invisible Man.” We’ve been staging a tent sit-in in Gwancheon, and one day we realized that people were just passing us by, without even a glance. We’ve become invisible to them. That’s why I’m grateful that we are able to stand on this stage and communicate with the general public. It was really meaningful to see ordinary people relate to our plight.

When people watch the workers’ performances and listen to their stories, they learn to empathize with the workers’ situations and their hearts are deeply moved. That’s when people realize that they must side with the unfairly treated people of this society.



(Woman 1) It was shocking. I didn’t know anything about the labor movement. I didn’t know these incidents actually took place. I was so ignorant. I’ll be looking for a job soon, and hearing these people’s stories upset me and moved me at the same time. I can relate to the minimum wage issues, because I’ve had lots of part-time jobs.
(Woman 2) I didn’t know the play was going to be like this. It was really moving. Art touches people’s hearts like this. I think the minds of more people can be changed with such an approach.

The Seoul Marginal Theater Festival has never been a popular, mainstream event, since its nature is quite experimental and it focuses on the stories of the fringe groups in our society. But for the past 16 years the festival has relentlessly championed the causes of marginalized people and now has succeeded in winning the attention of the general public. Theater has successfully brought down the barriers between the mainstream and the fringe.