Oreum

I was part of the summer 2025 cohort. I do not think any of my fellow artists would recommend Oreum residency to other artists. While the website and marketing may seem nice, the actual residency was far beyond disappointing. The people running the program speak as if they will support the artists, provide opportunities, send emails in a timely manner, and follow through on their words. This was certainly not what happened for us. There were red flags from early on but they seemed nice enough to overlook. For example, they would promise to send some info over in a week but weeks or even months would pass and then they would write to us, sometimes only after further follow up, and tell us to get back to them in a day or two. There were so many moments where we were misled. After some looking into things, we learned that the gallery we were told we would exhibit at didn't even have an official contract signed. At one point, we were told the gallery had gone through renovation so we would have to take taxis over to measure all of the spaces ourselves. When we arrived we found that the gallery was exactly as it was when we had first visited weeks prior. These are only a few examples. After weeks of shirked responsibilities and delays, the exhibition was unilaterally cancelled less than one week before the final opening date by the people running the program even after asking us to make all sorts of accommodations for it. We had left our artwork behind in Jeju without insurance or anyone staying there to and were waiting for it to be shipped to us in whatever condition and whatever timeline. Again, these are only a few examples. It would take too long to write a full account of all the frustrating moments of this without triggering myself again. Some of us considered taking legal action. Hopefully cedar Hill and disilence and any other groups partnering with Oreum are aware of the mismanagement and verbal manipulation a little bit with this review. Running a residency is not a simple task and artists' time, resources and funds should not be used in such ways. Jeju is beautiful, but I believe you are better off renting your own stay and doing art there rather than doing this program.