LECTURE| Every Fourteen Minutes: Architecture, Urbanization, and Memory Politics in Postwar North Korea by Dr. Cheehyung Harrison Kim

The birth of North Korea after the Korean War—centered on state authority and work culture—was distinctly represented by architecture. Architecture was divided into two interconnected types: monumental structures symbolizing the utopian vision of the state and vernacular structures instrumental to the regime of production. Architecture was also part of North Korea’s urbanization efforts through efficiency, prefabrication, and speed. “One apartment every fourteen minutes” was the motto born on the construction sites of Pyongyang. The memory of this postwar urbanization, which involved an immense level of international cooperation, began to fade in the 1970s. Yet this great built environment still stands today. Dr. Cheehyung Harrison Kim will discuss this postwar boom and drive toward construction in this lecture.