Drama Center/Dongrang Arts Center
Drama Center was built on April 12, 1962 by Dongrang Yoo Chi-jin, a pioneer of modern theater, to realize the belief that art creation and exploration, education for fostering art talents, and storage and distribution of art materials.
Drama Center was built in 1962, April. The best actors and staff of the time made a show for the opening of the center, live performances go on.
In addition, the drama center and Dongrang Repertory Theater Company organized and performed nearly 100 works on their own, and continued to pour out many problematic works. The drama center opened a theater library, theater academy and theater school.
The center also held a children's drama contest and a middle and high school drama contest to give teenagers the opportunity to experience theater plays, creating an opportunity to cultivate emotions and decide their career paths. It has been expanded to the Dongrang Youth Comprehensive Art Festival over 20 times and has been continuing until now.
He also tried to foster playwrights through playwriting workshops at the theater academy, and through the 13-year-long Celebration of Newly Winning Plays, he provided a stepping stone for young playwrights by performing more than 40 plays with excellent directors and actors.
Looking back on the difficult 60s, it would have been difficult to cope with the proliferation of performing arts activities due to economic development and national strength, and the increasing number of dramas and entertainment programs on television broadcasters, without the wisdom of Dongrang.
Since I was a college student in 1926, I thought about establishing a theater research institute like the Drama center.
To rebuild genuine Theater Art in this country where the tradition is almost stopped because the heritage is drained up, it needs a research institute to study thoroughly.
The Theatre Art Study Society(극예술연구회), joined together with colleagues in 1931, can be talked about as the first step of it.
- Ellipsis -
When our theater industry shrinks extremely because of the loss of three elements of play(audience, theater, artists) after the Korean War, and also because of the boom of film companies in 1956, I made up my mind to make this dream a reality.
After spending 4 years preparing(fundraising, securing land, and architectural design), we began the project in October, 1960.
Since then, additional facilities like Little theater, Theatre School, Theatre Library have been completed in 6 years. The Drama Center project is completed in about 10 years.
- The rest is omitted. -
After Finishing Construction of Drama Center 1966.11. Chief of Drama Center Yoo Chi Jin