PARK RI-WOONG

PARK Ri-woong is a visionary South Korean director whose work reimagines historical narratives through a contemporary lens. His groundbreaking feature The Land of Morning Calm (2023) has been hailed as "a seismic shift in Korean period cinema" (The Hollywood Reporter), blending traditional storytelling with avant-garde visual poetry. A graduate of KAFA (Korean Academy of Film Arts), Park first gained recognition with his experimental short Red Soil (2018), which won the Grand Prize at the Jeonju International Film Festival and was acquired by MoMA's permanent collection. His unique approach to Korean history - combining magical realism with documentary techniques - has drawn comparisons to Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Park Chan-wook's early works. The Land of Morning Calm, his debut feature, premiered in competition at Locarno Film Festival before winning the Best New Director award at the Blue Dragon Awards. The film's radical reinterpretation of the Joseon dynasty through queer and feminist perspectives sparked both controversy and acclaim, establishing Park as Korean cinema's most provocative new voice. Park's multimedia installations have been exhibited at Venice Biennale and National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea. He is currently developing an ambitious pan-Asian co-production about the Korean diaspora, supported by Sundance Institute and ARS Electronica.