VANK has launched a global campaign to preserve a collection of letters, photographs and other records documenting the lives of Koreans overseas, calling on the government to protect the materials at Hae-in’s Writing Room in Busan, which is scheduled to close this month.
Announced on Oct. 7, 2026, the campaign proposes three policy measures to ensure the collection is preserved and made accessible to future generations. VANK plans to gather support from Koreans at home and abroad through its national policy participation platform, Woollim, and its AI-powered legislative proposal platform, AI Legislator, and urge the government and National Assembly to adopt the proposals.
Located inside the Olivetan Benedictine Sisters convent in Suyeong-gu, Busan, Hae-in’s Writing Room is where Sister Lee Hae-in has spent more than three decades writing poetry and prose and corresponding with readers in Korea and abroad. The modest space, measuring about 33 square meters, opened in 1997 as a center for written ministry and became known as a place where people from around the world exchanged letters with the nun.
The collection includes thousands of letters, photographs and other materials sent by Koreans overseas, including miners and nurses dispatched to Germany, construction workers in the Middle East, immigrants in the United States and other parts of the world, and overseas missionaries. Some of the records date back to the 1970s and capture the experiences of Koreans living abroad, their longing for home and their efforts to maintain ties with their homeland.
VANK says the materials offer an important record of modern Korean history, shedding light on the everyday lives and migration experiences of overseas Koreans that are often missing from official statistics and historical accounts. However, the convent’s planned reconstruction and the resulting closure of Haein Writing Room have raised concerns that the collection could be lost or scattered.
VANK has proposed three measures to preserve the records and make them available for public education and research.
The first is to establish a permanent collection and exhibition at the National Museum of Korean Contemporary History, under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. VANK is calling for the systematic review, collection, classification and preservation of the letters, photographs, manuscripts and other materials, as well as special exhibitions or a permanent display introducing the history of overseas Koreans to the public.
The second proposal is to establish a Haein Writing Room exhibition and archive at the Overseas Korean Education and Cultural Center, which the Overseas Koreans Agency is pursuing. The plan would recreate elements of the original writing room, including its bookshelves and letters, and use the collection to develop educational materials about the lives of earlier generations of overseas Koreans. VANK says handwritten correspondence could help younger generations understand how their predecessors preserved their language, cultural identity and connection to Korea while living in unfamiliar surroundings.
The third proposal is to build an AI-powered digital exhibition on the Korean diaspora, connecting the histories and experiences of an estimated seven million Koreans living overseas. Citing ANU – Museum of the Jewish People in Israel as a reference, VANK envisions an online platform that would digitize Hae-in’s Writing Room collection and allow users around the world to explore its records.
The plan calls for handwritten letters to be converted into digital data using optical character recognition (OCR) and AI-based restoration technology. The materials could then be translated into multiple languages and organized by topic and other categories, making them searchable and accessible online. In the longer term, the platform could help descendants of overseas Koreans discover their family and community histories and learn about the lives of earlier generations.
Jeon Hye-rin, a youth researcher at VANK, said systematic preservation and use of the collection were needed to prevent records documenting the lives and experiences of first-generation overseas Koreans from disappearing. She added that the materials should be used to pass on the history and identity of overseas Korean communities to younger generations.
Park Gi-tae, head of VANK, said the letters at Hae-in’s Writing Room were a valuable legacy reflecting the lives and tears of Koreans who had carried their homeland in their hearts while building lives in unfamiliar countries. He stressed the need for a digital exhibition that would connect overseas Koreans through a shared history and cultural heritage.
VANK also pointed to the Overseas Koreans Agency’s planned 2027 budget of 136.9 billion won to support the identity of overseas Koreans, arguing that preserving records of the first generation should be part of those efforts.
To expand public support, VANK plans to produce digital posters and multilingual information cards outlining the three proposals and distribute them through overseas Korean association networks and social media. It will also run an online campaign through Woollim to encourage participation by the public and overseas Koreans, while using AI Legislative Officer to press for policy and legislative action.
The campaign comes as Korean communities overseas seek greater public recognition of their history and contributions. Recently, representatives of Korean associations in Africa and Asia who visited Korea for the World Korean Community Leaders Convention submitted a petition to the Overseas Koreans Agency calling for government-led preservation of Hae-in’s Writing Room collection and highlighting the need for a public archive.
VANK says preserving the records would safeguard more than a collection of personal correspondence: it would protect a part of modern Korean history and ensure that the experiences of Koreans who built lives abroad can be shared with future generations.