Most politically engaged photographic works are grounded in documentary practices. They tend to follow events as they unfold in real time or to explore their aftermath, whether through depictions of protests, state repression, or the individuals caught within these political phenomena. Such works usually rely on photographs captured directly from lived events rather than employing actors and staged narratives. An exception is Manit Sriwanichpoom’s THE BLOODLESS WAR (1997), which introduced actors and staged public scenes, including reenactments of iconic images such as Nick Ut’s Napalm Girl (1972) or Eddie Adams’s The Public Execution During the Vietnam War (1968). While resembling performance art, Sriwanichpoom’s project ultimately reached its audience through the medium of photography.

A comparable approach can be found in Canadian photographer Jeff Wall’s Dead Troops Talk (A vision after an ambush of a Red Army patrol, near Moqor, Afghanistan, winter 1986). Like THE BLOODLESS WAR, it evokes the aesthetic of war photography, yet the work was entirely constructed in a studio with actors. The result is a surreal and grotesque tableau in which the dead rise to converse about their wounds. Wall’s staging reflects the brutality of war through a darkly comic lens, prompting viewers to ask whether war might indeed be both horrific and absurd.


Korean photographer Hakbong Kwon (권학봉 씀) also turns to photography to interrogate the history and fragility of South Korean democracy. His project The Independence Movement: Layered Gazes is framed through the figure of a young girl in a traditional Korean school uniform, recalling Yu Gwan-sun (유관순, 1902–1920), one of the most resonant symbols of Korea’s struggle against Japanese colonial rule.

Kwon’s reflections acquired new urgency when President Yoon Suk-yeol declared martial law on December 3, 2024, citing the need to protect the nation from North Korean communists and domestic anti-state forces. The announcement shocked not only Kwon but the global public, revealing that the threat to democracy he once imagined as external was in fact rooted in internal political maneuvering that disregarded the people.

This moment compelled Kwon to reconsider the “true foundations of the Republic of Korea.” Both the fight for independence and the overthrow of military dictatorships had been won at the cost of countless lives. Among these sacrifices, Yu Gwan-sun stands as one of the earliest and most powerful symbols.


Korea’s subjugation under Japanese colonial rule began in 1910. The demand for independence was shaped by multiple forces: pervasive oppression, the adoption of Western democratic ideals, and inspiration from regional transformations such as the collapse of the Qing dynasty and Japan’s own Meiji reforms. These culminated in the March 1st Movement of 1919, when scholars and religious leaders in Seoul issued a declaration of independence. More than two million people joined demonstrations across the country for several months, and Japan responded with violent repression that left over 7,000 dead.

Yu Gwan-sun, then a teenager, took part in these protests and later led demonstrations in her hometown. Japanese troops killed several participants, including her parents. She was arrested, tortured at Seodaemun Prison, and died there at the age of only eighteen. Her story endures as a powerful emblem of the Korean struggle against unjust rule, whether imposed by foreign occupiers or by domestic regimes.

Kwon’s project seeks to embody what might be described as the “spirit” or “abstract legacy” of Yu Gwan-sun as a figure representing all those who sacrificed their lives for independence. He stages her spectral presence at historical sites associated with political resistance, including the Aunae marketplace where she organized protests and lost her parents, the Seodaemun Prison where she was tortured and died, and the Cheonan Yu Gwan-sun Memorial Hall.


In these images the figure hovers above the ground, her outstretched hands suggesting a gesture of questioning directed at contemporary Korean society. Were the sacrifices of those who gave their lives worthwhile? Has the principle of resisting authoritarianism survived, or has it been extinguished by the will of a single political figure? In which direction are the Korean people leading their nation? These questions emerge from her simple gestures and the austerity of Hakbong Kwon’s black and white photographs.

One particularly striking image depicts the Korean Independence Hall in Cheonan (Image 4). Unlike most of the photographs, which tend to exclude human presence, floating in silence, and seems to pose questions to the void. Yet this image evokes Yu Gwan-sun addressing the 3,000 demonstrators gathered at the Aunae marketplace, raising fundamental questions before the crowd.

Is the struggle for freedom from oppression still ongoing?
Who determines the fate of the nation, if not its people?

These questions might have never been spoken, yet they remain universal.
Hovering across borders and time, echoing through every generation.