- Selected as the Yeosu Expo’s best recycled cement silo
… Pursuing to set a new Guinness Book record

A cement silo left vacant in a port has been reborn as the world’s largest pipe organ.

The Organizing Committee of the 2012 Yeosu Expo (Chairman Gang dong-seok) announced on September 5 that it had selected The Sound Wave submitted by Professor Hong Seung-pyo of Hankyong National University as the final winner of the “Yeosu Expo’s Silo Recycling” contest.

The silo recycling project of Yeosu Expo was to give rebirth to the cement silo left vacant at the site of the exposition into an artistic work in line with the eco-friendly spirit of the exposition.

The Sound Wave, the final winner, is the creation into an artwork of the image of large waves on the sea in front of Yeosu while keeping the original form of a silo. It was evaluated as being an original work of art that has merged the sound of the Yeosu sea with that of a pipe organ.

If the 30-story high Sound Wave is constructed, it would be largest pipe organ in the world and could be registered as a new Guinness Book Record, according to Professor Hong.

The Sound Wave is to put Yeosu’s sea water instead of cement inside the silo and process it into freshwater, which will be provided to visitors coming to the exposition’s site as fresh and clean water of the future.

Director Yang Hong-ju of the Exhibition Department Two of the Organizing Committee said, “The Sound Wave expresses well the regional characteristics of Yeosu as a port city and the theme of the Yeosu Expo of ‘Living Sea, Breathing Seashore’.” He continued, “Once the work is completed in December 2011, it will become a landmark representing the southern seashore as well as the 2012 Yeosu Expo.”

Fourty-nine artworks from seven countries were submitted to the “Yeosu Expo Silo Recycling” contest and of these, five passed the first screening and the final winner was selected through a second screening.

Other than “The Sound Wave,” “The Earth Shuttle” of Lee Yong-ryeol, which was to create a space to experience time travel and climate change such as rain, thunder and tornado and “Il Mare” of Kim Gyeong-jin, which expressed the space and communication between nature and people, were also selected as winners.

*** Questions: Son Dong-wol, Organizing Committee, Yeosu Expo [02-740-4751]