NORTH KOREA-DUTCH COLLECTOR/POSTERS Dutch national hopes North Korean posters provides "inside look" into isolated state

Record ID: 145346

  • Title: NORTH KOREA-DUTCH COLLECTOR/POSTERS Dutch national hopes North Korean posters provides "inside look" into isolated state
  • Date: 31st July 2015
  • Summary: SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA (JULY 21, 2015) (REUTERS) PEOPLE LOOKING AT NORTH KOREAN POSTERS MAN LOOKING AT NORTH KOREAN POSTERS (SOUNDBITE) (Korean) 24-YEAR-OLD SOUTH KOREAN EXHIBITION VISITOR, KANG JAE-WON, SAYING: "I could get to know how passionate he is (about his collection) after hearing that he was even imprisoned in 2011 while collecting (the posters). And through these po
  • Embargoed: 15th August 2015 13:00
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  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA9C25K47B7YDK7B4E7XBQZ4KGF
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Dutch philatelist Willem Van der Bijl, 63, first visited North Korea in 1998 at the invitation of the Korea Stamp Corporation.
    Seventeen years later, and after 24 visits to the reclusive state, he has managed to collect more than 1,000 North Korean propaganda posters, 70 of which are now on display at an exhibition titled "North Korea Project" in Seoul to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the end of World War Two.
    The Dutchman is hoping his rare collection - the pursuit of which once got him arrested for spying in the North - will offer an "inside look" into the isolated country still technically at war with the South.
    Van der Bijl said a friend of his, Dr. Koen De Ceuster, who lectures at Leiden University in the Netherlands and specialises in Korean history, politics, economy and language expressed an interest in the collection and had scanned each poster for further study. Van der Bijl, who ran a small office in Pyongyang to effectively purchase many of the posters, felt this academic interest proved the collection had value.
    "Of course, the history of North Korea is shown in posters because my first posters are from 1952 and the latest of 2011, so the whole - there is more than a thousand pieces - so the whole range is through the years. And of course they can translate and many times there is a deeper meaning behind it," he said, referring to a Korean study team that has helped him delve into the meaning behind the posters.
    Trips to the North came to an end in 2010, when Van der Bijl was arrested for spying, an allegation he denies. Van der Bijl says he was interrogated everyday for two weeks without being able to contact his family.
    "I was afraid, yes of course. They mentioned a 15-year labour sentence and things like that, on stupid reasons - I am a spy and all that kind of nonsense. Now I am not really spy-looking I think, but okay. But no, it was not nice," he said.
    He was expelled from the state after he was forced to sign a confession, marking an end to his poster collecting, van der Bijl said.
    Despite the unhappy ending with the reclusive state, the collector hopes his posters will reveal unknown aspects about the North and enable a better global understanding.
    "I hope it helps because it gives an inside look in a county that they don't know much about because what you read in the newspapers is more less always the same. And here you see a lot of aspects you've never heard about that is also existing in North Korea," he said.
    One visitor to the exhibition felt Van der Bijl's personal story added to the overall experience.
    "I could get to know how passionate he is (about his collection) after hearing that he was even imprisoned in 2011 while collecting (the posters). And through these posters, I can gain a real understanding of situations in North Korea that I only roughly understood before. So it was a good exhibition," said 24-year-old Kang Jae-won.
    Another visitor felt the exhibition was timely, as both the North and South commemorate the end of World War Two. In South Korea, the anniversary is usually marked by various North Korea related events, as well as anti-Japan events in remembrance of the war.
    "I think that poster itself is the picture delivering messages to North Korean people. It was a great opportunity to see all these pictures at once. I especially think that I have had a beautiful time looking at these posters at this time of marking the 70th anniversary of the Liberation," said 39-year-old Lee Jung-sook.
    The exhibition opened on July 21 and will continue until September 29.
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