The first issue is the dispute over the Art Decoration Law for buildings, which is the national cultural policy that mandates acquisition of public sculptures.
In this article, the Flying City and Oasis Project's practices will be mainly discussed based on receiving major attention from the mass media and art field.
The proliferation and popularity of public sculptures originated from the establishment of the Art Decoration Law for buildings when the Korean government was hosting the Olympic Games in 1988.
However, questions have been raised over the artistic quality over these works, especially because most of the public sculptures remain in modernist style, which was the mainstream at the time the law was first established.
Furthermore, only a handful of artists were repeatedly commissioned and even subcontracted to foundries resulting in more problems in the production and dissemination of public sculptures.
At the event, murals were placed along various locations around the Anyang River as the center, photograph exhibitions were posted on billboards, and art objects were presented.
The Seoul Metropolitan Government also kicked off a project in 2002 that restored the Chunggye River, located between City hall and Shindab, which was formerly covered over with a concrete-covered freeway overpass.
The freeway was razed and the project was completed on October 1, 2005 after spending 1.5 trillion Korean won (1.4 billion US dollars) by the city government.
First, the urban research group Flying City was formed with Jeon Yongseok, Jang Jongkwan, and Kim Gisoo.
The area along the Chunggye River in particular, is the heart of post-war industrialization as well as the most historical site where they carried out series of public art projects.
Flying City recently organized the Chunggye Mini Expo Project that introduced machine parts manufacturing stores in the area.
The group introduced the concept of “squatting” to Korea and worked actively with the mission of rejuvenating abandoned or decommissioned buildings.
Later on, Oasis put on an advertisement announcing that office spaces in the 25 storey-high KFAO building were available for rent on the market and made a call for applicants.
The group's activities differentiated themselves by the complexity and diversity in their programming as well as their administrational efficiency during the office space distribution performance.
The criticism by public art associations on the mismanagement of the Art Decoration Law for buildings, the Oasis group and their criticism of the funding administration practices by the MCT and KCAF, Jihye Kim's Daechoo-ri Project dealing with the right-of-residence issue between the US military base and the native residents, and Kyongju Park's performances on migrant workers eligibility in running for election to government posts, can all be considered as cultural activist work dealing with societal and political issues.
Oasis employed this approach through organizing performances lasting over a month and accompanied by the introduction of an activist measure called squatting.