“Over the past few decades, South Korea has become a more competitive society, with the current times overlapping against its cultural and ethnic background. As a result, South Korea has the highest youth suicide rate among developed countries and the lowest birth rate in the world. Some young people jokingly refer to their country as ‘Hell Korea’,” photographer Yang Seung-Woo writes in TFW Korea.
In the book, Yang portrays numerous young people from South Korea. Like Yang himself, they do not conform to the ideals imposed by South Korean society, either in the way they look, think, or what they want out of life. Through a series of photographs and interview snippets, Yang captures and celebrates their unique approach to life while questioning the current state of South Korean society, where young people are suffocating under the weight of expectations and self-expression has become an act of courage.
The project itself was born out of a tragedy that made international news, that resulted in the deaths of over 150 people and hurt nearly 200 more. “It had been a while since I last visited my hometown in South Korea, when I heard about the shocking accident in 2023. On a weekend close to Halloween, a crowd crush occurred in Itaewon, a neighborhood in Seoul full of young people. I couldn’t believe that so many people could die in the accident,” told Yang to Blind. “This is the second time in a row that a major accident has killed a lot of young people while I was in South Korea. I was also in the country when the MV Sewol Ferry sank … I suddenly felt the urge to meet and chat with these young people.”
Yang Seung-Woo first came into photography not out of a love for the medium, but rather as a way to get a visa to study abroad, in Japan actually, and get himself out of Korea. But while taking an aesthetics class, the students listened to classical music and were asked to make a movie based on the piece that they heard. He enjoyed film, but was not interested in working as part of a team to make one. So he began making photographs as it was something he could do alone.
He graduated from Nippon Photography Institute and the photography department at Tokyo Polytechnic University. He then went on to do graduate research in Media Art at Tokyo Polytechnic University, and finally began his career as a photographer in Japan.
Photography is also how Yang Seung-Woo met the Korean young people that are included in his project. “About half of them were the kids who came to my photo exhibitions. I talked with them and invited them to join the project. I recruited the rest through Instagram. Some of them are my old acquaintances, too.”
The Korean society that Yang and his subjects have rebelled against is one of high competition, and where academic background, appearance, and family is seen as most important. “The first thing that can be taken care of by oneself is academic background, so most of the attention is paid to that. Next comes appearance, which is why plastic surgery is so popular. It is not unusual to receive cosmetic surgery as a gift for entering school,” told Yang. “As for family background, it cannot be helped. If you have good looks, it is advantageous to get a job … In districts where cosmetic surgery is famous, it seems like there are actually a lot of people who have the same kind of face.”
The young people in the photographs would not look out of place in New York City or most other major cities across the United States. Dyed hair in a series of different colors, tattoos, shaved heads, eccentric clothes, are all nothing out of the ordinary in America. The portraits, done in vivid color show the subjects goofing off, striking random funny poses, and just being young. They appear to be just youthful members of society showing their individuality among their peers.
There’s currently a high rate of suicide among young people in Korea. This rate has been rising in the country for the last few decades. The suicide rate is one of the highest in the developed world, at 24.6 for every 100,000 people. In comparison, the United States has a rate 14.5 per 100,000 according to information compiled by The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Between 2018 and 1019, the number of Koreans under age 40 who took their own lives rose 10 percent.
“I believe that the high suicide rate among young people in Korea is due to the extremely competitive society and the lack of diversity of values in society, people are educated to believe that anything other than what they are told by others and society as ‘security’ or ‘success’ is not what are expected.” Yang explained. “Because of this kind of upbringing, many young people have no idea what to do if they cannot meet these expectations. I think their minds are exhausted. It would be different if there were adults around who could take good care of them, but I think it is hard for children’s individuality to be recognized.”
The kids in Yang Seung-Woo’s photographs have all grown up surrounded by this phenomenon. Some of his subjects have run away from home, hoping for a different path, against what their parents wanted for them. Some are shut in because of arguments with people in authority and, as such, have cut themselves off from society. Others are depressed because they have been bullied.
Yang’s images ambition to be seen by young people who are lost and missing out on the stereotypical “success” that drives Korean society, and trigger in them a way to have something to look forward to in life. In the meantime, they show that there is no right way to live, and try to give the Korean youth a way to think about their own lives in relation to society norms.
Is there hope for these teenagers and young adults that things will get better? “I don’t know much, but as someone outside of the Korean society, as I’m living in Japan, it seems difficult for now,” says Yang Seung-Woo. “But I also feel that time may be able to solve the problem. Perhaps, when young people become older, like my age. By that time, there may be different problems such as the decrease of birth rate and lack of young people.” And just perhaps, that will be enough to crack open the strict social norms of South Korea, so that the next generation will not face the same stigmas that are faced by its youth today.
TFW Korea is published by the Zen Foto Gallery in Tokyo, Japan. The book can be purchased on their website. An exhibition is on display at the gallery from January 10 through February 22, 2025. Information on the exhibition can be found here.
