111 DAYS of discipline

Reflections on Mark Mingu Cho’s photo book 111 DAYS published by m.33 publishing.

To Mark, 

I see this book is a documentary of your travel. 111 photos from 111 days in 11 cities. 

You called it exposure therapy. 

To see the infection of hate into the streets of the world. 

To see the vandals in their last hope. Affirming their love and loss with a paint pen to a wall or window.

Each photo in this book is not just a scene from your pilgrimage but they hold a history of skin peeling to the raw, burned, bloody dregs of a wall’s soul. The wall of pg 41 has been scarred,

bandaged, and torn apart again. Each layer added is a pasty rebuke on the last. Each layer torn back is a distress and denial. 

These walls hold whole arguments. Arguments of rage, hate, denial, dissatisfaction. 

They are loud like a tree falling in the forest. 

Like a underwater earthquake. 

Like a scream into a pillow. 

Loud. Yet ignored by most passers by. 

You have lent your ear to these walls. 

With generosity, and patience, you have listened to their hate. Memorialised by your camera. 

Though you say it choked you at times. 

You did not let it become you. 

You found the threads of hope. 

Perhaps that is the task of us in the first half of our twenties. (Or anyone really).

To be in the chaos and remain calm. Not remaining calm out of denial or naïveté, but out of discipline. Discipline in listening, noticing, and waiting. In this discipline we can be productive. We can be hopeful. We can be faithful. 

Your photo book has done this. 

I think you have done this. 

Thank you 

Rosie