Breathing Underwater

Heeyoung Koh

"Breathing Underwater" is a film portrait by Heeyoung Koh of The Haenyeo, a female fishing community on the South Korean Island of Jeju.

"Mulsum" translates as "breathing underwater" a phrase describing the temptation to catch oxygen while still submerged, a reflex that cannot be controlled and results in drowning. The Haenyeo know that this is a risk and that one day this mighthappen and their lives will end. The Haenyeo's live within a philosophy of life cycles and sacrifice to the sea.

Heeyoung Koh, is the daughter of a Haenyeo and spent 7 years of exclusive filming to reveal a closed community of ordinary people who live extraodinary lives. As fewer and fewer are training to become Haenyeo, most are now either at retirement age or older and in many ways challenge the ubiquitous prioritising of youth.

"Breathing Underwater" was screened at The National Maritime Museum in Greenwich as part of a "Haenyeo: Women Of The Sea". This was a Waugh Office event curated by Soo Cho and Mark Waugh in 2017.