[K-ART FOCUS] Lee Ye-eun finds meaning and life in ordinary objects

Photographer Lee Ye-eun’s outdoor exhibition “People of Baegyeon-ri” uses residents’ belongings to portray everyday life in the border village of Baegyeon-ri, Paju, Gyeonggi Province. She borrowed objects from residents, arranged them into precarious towers and photographed them against the village landscape. Lee’s tower projects grew from her interest in how ordinary objects hold memories and offer comfort. Her work also draws on stories from her family and the people she meets through factory and warehouse jobs.

Baegyeon-ri, also known as Tongil-chon or Unification Village, was established in 1973 to showcase South Korean agriculture to the North.

Lee spent about a month asking village residents to lend meaningful objects, promising to return them after photographing them.

Lee began her tower project during the COVID-19 pandemic, inspired by treasured keepsakes and traditional stone wishing towers.

Lee builds her towers without adhesive, and some arrangements take hours while others resist for months.

Objects in Lee’s family tower included her mother’s wedding-furniture drawer and pillowcase, her father’s case of children’s letters and certificates, a family Bible, her brother’s factory-work jacket and yut sticks.

Published Oct 30, 2026 7:00 am KST

Photographer builds precarious towers of ordinary items to tell stories of labor, family and people around her

Lee Ye-eun's "People of Baegyeon-ri" series installed at Paju Pyeonghwa Nuri / Yonhap

A rice bowl, a pair of scissors and a notebook with vehicle numbers might seem ordinary. In Lee Ye-eun’s photographs, however, they became the faces of a border village between the two Koreas.

Her outdoor exhibition, “People of Baegyeon-ri,” presented as part of “DMZ Open Exhibition: Staging,” brings together belongings lent by residents of a village in Paju, Gyeonggi Province. Also known as Tongil-chon, or Unification Village, Baegyeon-ri lies just south of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), within a military-controlled area where civilian access is restricted.

Established in 1973 to showcase South Korean agriculture to the North, the village is defined by its unusual geopolitical position. But Lee wanted to look beyond that distinction to the people who live and work there — growing crops, preparing meals and tending flowers.

“Tongil-chon sounds like somewhere very special, but Baegyeon-ri sounds like a village you might find anywhere,” she said in a recent interview with The Korea Times. “These aren’t extraordinary people. They’re ordinary people working hard to make a life here.”

For about a month, Lee walked through the village, asking residents to lend objects that meant something to them. She promised to return the items after photographing them.

The village administrator, who juggled between operating a forklift, guiding visitors and managing the village museum for a living, contributed a notebook filled with vehicle numbers. A woman working at a restaurant supplied a rice bowl, an everyday vessel of their labor. A farmer handed over his scissors.

Lee arranged the objects into precarious towers in an open, grassy space, photographing them against the village landscape. “When I look at these pictures, I think of those people,” she said.

Lee Ye-eun's "Mind Building 06" (2020) / Courtsy of Lee Ye-eun

Finding balance and comfort

Lee’s tower project began during the COVID-19 pandemic, when she wondered whether a single photograph could offer comfort.

Looking around her home, she realized her treasured possessions were not expensive objects but containers of memories: stones collected with friends, movie tickets and small festival souvenirs.

Traditional stone wishing towers encountered on village walks suggested a form.

“A stone lying on the ground is nothing special on its own. But when someone stacks it with a wish on top of other stones, it becomes a wishing tower,” she said. “It might not actually grant the wish, but the feeling behind it seemed so tender.”

She began borrowing objects that had comforted others and built wishing towers of her own.

An old lady in her neighborhood offered a hoe, declaring she could do anything with it. Marriage migrants from Vietnam and Nepal contributed a shuttlecock, a reminder of evenings playing badminton after difficult days. Another woman lent the small stones she used to play with her grandmother — a game that helped them connect despite their quarrels.

The objects differed, but each carried a personal history. By stacking them, Lee sought to give those memories a physical form — one that could be shared and remembered.

Father as inspiration

Lee Ye-eun / Courtesy of Lee Ye-eun

Her interest in preserving such stories through photography came from her father.

One day, Lee was driving her father home after they had shared a meal. When a song about sewing machines came on the radio, he began talking about his childhood, when he had left home for Seoul to work before finishing middle school.

He had worked at a banner-making shop, sleeping beneath a worktable as machines rattled overhead. Instead of being annoyed by the noise, "he called the noise a lullaby."

"He was grateful to have somewhere to sleep," Lee recalled.

The story changed how Lee understood her father who also encouraged her to pursue photography.

She knew the story well, but one day while working in a factory herself and talking with co-workers about what it meant to earn a living, she heard something different.

“For the first time in my life, I think I heard that story not as a daughter listening to her father, but as one worker listening to another,” she said. “It broke my heart to think that a person’s entire history might end as something told to his daughter over a dinner drink.”

She felt compelled to preserve his story. The encounter also helped shape her approach to documenting the experiences of people whose lives might otherwise go unrecorded.

Lee Ye-eun's "Again, Democracy, Again 2" (2025) at the National Museum of Korean Democracy / Courtesy of the artist

Keep things precarious

To build her towers, Lee uses no adhesive. These are precarious belongings, however ordinary they look, she said.

Some towers take hours to make. Others resist for months, she said. The camera is ready before the construction begins. Once the objects stand after countless falls, she retreats carefully to capture the moment.

What matters is not an elegant silhouette but finding an arrangement that holds.

“The same object can stand or fall depending on what is above and below it,” she said. “That feels so much like relationships. The same person sometimes makes you feel discouraged and fall apart, but that person can also help you stand upright.”

Her life as a photographer is as precarious as the towers she built.

Living in a small village in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province, she has developed her art during years of factory and warehouse work. Those workplaces are not simply a means of earning a living, but where she forms relationships and encounters the stories that become part of her photographs. During graduate school, she juggled an assistantship role, classes and night shifts, accepting art projects even when she lacked time and energy.

Even now, she continues to work in warehouses, taking photography assignments and helping install exhibitions to earn a living.

Lee Ye-eun's "Space Building 16" (2021) / Courtesy of Lee Ye-eun

Workers and her own family

That led her to pay attention to labor, frequently featuring objects from workers near her in her photography.

Lee built a tower from cleaning workers’ spray bottle and rubber gloves alongside exhibition installation supplies, bringing into view the people whose labor keeps the galleries running. At the National Museum of Korean Democracy, objects associated with democratic struggle formed another tower: a process of building, collapsing and rebuilding.

Lee also made a tower with objects from her own family. The photographer used a drawer from her mother’s wedding gift furniture, her father’s locked case of children’s letters and certificates, a family Bible, the jacket her younger brother wears when he works at a factory and yut sticks, which her family uses for a traditional game they play a lot during holidays.

Another key item was her mother’s pillowcase. As a child, when her overwhelmed mother left home for days, she held it, breathing in her scent and waiting for her return.

“Our family is such a mess,” she said, laughing. “It’s amazing that we’re still holding together.”

She said she never knows the tower’s final shape beforehand.

“Even if it isn’t impressive, I love it as it is,” she said.

Lee Ye-eun's "Portrait of a Certain Family" (2023) / Courtesy of Lee Ye-eun

摄影师李艺恩的户外展览“白延里人”利用居民的物品，描绘了京畿道坡州市白延里边境村庄的日常生活。她从居民那里借来物品，将它们搭建成摇摇欲坠的塔状，并以村庄景观为背景进行拍摄。李艺恩的塔状作品源于她对日常物品如何承载记忆和提供慰藉的兴趣。她的作品也取材于她的家庭故事以及她在工厂和仓库工作中遇到的形形色色的人的故事。

白延里，又名统一村，建于 1973 年，旨在向朝鲜展示韩国农业。

李花了大约一个月的时间，向村民们借出有意义的物品，并承诺在拍照后归还。

李在新冠疫情期间开始了她的塔楼项目，灵感来自珍贵的纪念品和传统的石头许愿塔。

李在搭建她的塔时没有使用粘合剂，有些塔需要几个小时才能建成，而有些塔则需要几个月才能建成。

李家的塔楼里摆放着她母亲结婚时用的家具抽屉和枕套、她父亲装孩子信件和证书的盒子、一本家传圣经、她哥哥的工厂工作服和茅草棍。

发布于2026年10月30日 上午7:00（韩国标准时间）

摄影师用日常物品搭建摇摇欲坠的高塔，讲述她身边关于劳动、家庭和人们的故事。

李艺恩的“白延里人”系列作品在坡州平和庭院展出 / 韩联社

一个饭碗、一把剪刀和一个记着车牌号的笔记本，看似普通，但在李艺恩的镜头下，却成了朝韩边境村庄的象征。

她的户外展览“白延里村民”是“DMZ开放展览：舞台”的一部分，展出了京畿道坡州市白延里村村民提供的物品。白延里村又名统一村，位于非军事区（DMZ）以南，属于军事管制区，平民进出受到限制。

该村建于1973年，旨在向朝鲜展示韩国农业，其独特的地理政治位置使其与众不同。但李先生希望超越这一特殊性，关注生活和工作在那里的人们——他们种植庄稼、准备饭菜、照料花卉。

“统一村听起来像个非常特别的地方，但白延里听起来就像你在任何地方都能找到的那种村庄，”她在最近接受《韩国时报》采访时说。“这些人并不特殊，他们只是努力在这里生活的普通人。”

大约一个月的时间里，李在村子里走遍了所有地方，请求村民们借出对他们有意义的物品。她承诺拍照后会归还这些物品。

村里的行政官员为了谋生，身兼数职，既要开叉车，又要带游客参观，还要管理村里的博物馆。他捐出了一本记满车牌号的笔记本。一位在餐馆工作的妇女送来了一个饭碗，这是他们日常劳作的器皿。一位农民交出了他的剪刀。

李将这些物品摆放在一片开阔的草地上，搭成摇摇欲坠的塔状，并以村庄的景色为背景进行拍摄。“当我看着这些照片时，我就会想起那些人，”她说。

李艺恩作品《心灵大厦06》（2020）/图片由李艺恩提供

寻找平衡与舒适

李的塔楼项目始于新冠疫情期间，当时她想知道一张照片是否能给人带来慰藉。

环顾自己的家，她意识到自己珍爱的物品不是昂贵的物件，而是承载着回忆的容器：和朋友一起收集的石头、电影票和小小的节日纪念品。

在村庄散步时遇到的传统石头许愿塔给了我一些启发。

“一块石头单独躺在地上没什么特别的。但当有人把写着愿望的石头堆在其他石头上时，它就变成了一座许愿塔，”她说。“它或许不能真的实现愿望，但背后的情感却如此真挚动人。”

她开始借用那些曾给别人带来安慰的物品，并建造了自己的许愿塔。

邻居一位老太太借来一把锄头，说有了它什么都能干。来自越南和尼泊尔的婚姻移民捐出一个羽毛球，让人想起忙碌一天后一起打羽毛球的夜晚。另一位妇女借出她小时候和祖母一起玩的小石子——这个游戏让她们即使争吵也能保持联系。

这些物品各不相同，但每一件都承载着一段个人历史。李通过将它们堆叠起来，试图将这些记忆具象化——一种可以被分享和铭记的实体。

父亲的激励

李艺恩/由李艺恩提供

她对通过摄影保存这类故事的兴趣源于她的父亲。

一天，李和父亲吃完饭后开车送他回家。收音机里播放着一首关于缝纫机的歌，父亲开始谈起自己的童年，那时他还没读完中学就离家去首尔打工了。

他曾在一家横幅制作店工作，睡在工作台下，头顶机器轰鸣作响。他非但没有被噪音打扰，反而称这种噪音为“摇篮曲”。

李回忆说：“他很感激能有个地方睡觉。”

这个故事改变了李对她父亲的理解，她的父亲也一直鼓励她从事摄影事业。

她对这个故事很熟悉，但有一天，当她自己在一家工厂工作，与同事们谈论谋生的意义时，她听到了一些不同的说法。

“我这辈子第一次听到这个故事，不是以女儿听父亲讲述的身份，而是以一个工人听另一个工人讲述的身份，”她说。“想到一个人的全部人生经历可能最终只是在餐桌上和女儿喝着酒时讲述的，我感到非常心痛。”

她感到有义务记录下他的故事。这次经历也帮助她形成了记录那些原本可能被遗忘的人们的经历的方式。

李艺恩作品《再次民主，再次2》（2025年）现藏于韩国国立民主博物馆 / 图片由艺术家提供

保持岌岌可危的状态

李在搭建她的积木塔时没有使用任何粘合剂。她说，这些东西虽然看起来很普通，但其实很不牢固。

她说，有些塔只需几个小时就能建成，而有些则需要几个月的时间才能完成。在建造开始之前，相机就已经准备就绪。当这些塔在无数次的跌倒后屹立不倒时，她会小心翼翼地退后一步，捕捉那一刻。

重要的不是优雅的外形，而是找到一种能够维持下去的布局。

“同一个物体能否站立或倒下，取决于它上方和下方的物体，”她说。“这感觉很像人际关系。同一个人有时会让你感到沮丧和崩溃，但这个人也能帮助你重新站起来。”

她作为摄影师的生活就像她建造的高塔一样岌岌可危。

她居住在京畿道利川市的一个小村庄，多年来在工厂和仓库工作，逐渐形成了自己的艺术风格。这些工作场所不仅仅是谋生的手段，更是她建立人际关系、邂逅故事的地方，而这些故事最终都成为了她摄影作品的一部分。读研究生期间，她一边担任助教，一边上课，还要上夜班，即便时间精力有限，她也坚持接受各种艺术项目。

即使现在，她仍然在仓库工作，接一些摄影任务，帮忙安装展览，以此谋生。

李艺恩作品《太空16号楼》（2021）/ 图片由李艺恩提供

工人和她自己的家人

这使她开始关注劳动，经常在摄影作品中出现她身边工人的物品。

李用清洁工人的喷雾瓶、橡胶手套以及展览布展用品搭建了一座塔，以此展现那些维持美术馆运转的劳动者。在韩国国立民主博物馆，与民主斗争相关的物品构成了另一座塔：象征着建造、倒塌和重建的过程。

李还用自己家里的物品搭建了一座塔。这位摄影师用到了母亲结婚时收到的家具抽屉、父亲存放孩子们信件和证书的上锁盒子、一本家传圣经、弟弟在工厂上班时穿的夹克衫，以及他们家在节假日经常玩的一种传统游戏——木棍。

另一件重要的物品是她母亲的枕套。小时候，每当她母亲因压力过大而离家数日时，她就会紧紧抱着枕套，深深吸着母亲的气息，等待母亲归来。

“我们家简直一团糟，”她笑着说。“我们居然还能维持在一起，真是个奇迹。”

她说她事先并不知道这座塔的最终形状。

“即使它并不惊艳，我也很喜欢它现在的样子，”她说。

李艺恩作品《某家族的肖像》（2023）/图片由李艺恩提供