[KS] Korean term for wabi-sabi and its origin

[Frank Hoffmann]

Dear Dr. Lee:

Questions countering your (forwarded) question:

(1) I see your student is familiar with Japanese concepts like 
wabi-sabi, with interpretative models. In that case I wonder what came 
first, his awareness of this Japanese concept or his "observation" of, 
as he says, the "*intentional* qualities" of "imperfection, 
impermanence, and incompleteness"?

(2) Furthermore, I also do not think your student will get very far 
even asking this question in this particular way. At least since the 
later 1970s, and then very intensely so during the 1990s, there has 
been a bulk of literature--there where conferences, workshops, and also 
exhibitions that all dealt with the issue of Yanagi Sōetsu (alias 
Yanagi Muneyoshi), colonialism, colonialist aesthetics, and his implied 
concept of "beauty of sadness" (hiai no bi 悲哀の美) that he claimed he 
"observed" in Korea and that he consequently applied to all things 
Korean, that made up the essence of his understanding of Korean art and 
crafts. Most obviously, when a colonizer who goes by--I simplify, but 
not too much--"wabi-sabi," intentional incompleteness, then claims to 
have found that same beauty of incompleteness being produced as 
"un-intended incompleteness" (in Korea) to result in the same beauty, 
then that is for him like gold made from water drops. That same claim, 
though, reinforces the colonizer's (Japan) superiority over the 
colonized (Korea), as it shows that the colonizer is smart enough, is 
sophisticated enough to appreciate such aesthetics, while the colonized 
"subjects" as producers of such appreciated objects are on the 
primitive site of things: they produce beauty without even 
understanding and appreciating what they do there. ... If I try a 
little harder, I can rephrase this in more scholastic terms. However, 
THAT is the very basis of the discourse, and your "wabi-sabi" plays 
very directly into that. 
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That whole discourse has also been immensely important when discussing 
modern/modernist works of Korean art from the colonial period. A good, 
clear-cut example, are the above works by Yi In-s?ng, one reproduced on 
the cover of Sunyoung Park's brilliant translation of short stories by 
some writers that themselves are counted among 'colaborators' -- BUT 
produced just amazingly sharp and enjoyable stories, and on the right 
the marketing of the best known of Yi's paintings that had been 
attacked all through the 1980s and 1990s for its "colonizer's 
aesthetic," the mimicking of Paul Gauguin's Tahiti series, the 
modernist colonial "local color" style. I had given this example here 
on the list before and I am repeating myself. What is new is that in 
the past few years the situation has changed from what we saw in the 
1990s, that after everyone has had so tremendously much fun playing the 
pointing fingers, post-colonial suffering and abuse card, now the 
discourse has finally opened. In literature that happened a little 
earlier than in the visual arts. Aesthetics (bad term, though--lets 
just say 'taste & appreciation') is now being RENEGOTIATED, as it 
always is as time goes by and our economic interests and political 
ideologies etc. change--art history 101. That 'wabi-sabi' and 'hiai no 
bi' crap will unlikely get its change now either, but the discourse is 
now being informed by marketing strategies rather than those 
post-colonial bad guys/good guys, heroes/collaborators monologues.

A 2008 example from _Japan Focus_:
http://www.japanfocus.org/-Park-Yuha/2923
"Victims of Japanese Imperial Discourse: Korean Literature Under 
Colonial Rule"
Park Yuha (transl, by Gavin Walker)

... as I said, art critics and historians are always late in the game, 
but we finally get there (maybe when the in literary theory are up the 
the next step).


Best,
Frank





On Sun, 17 Nov 2013 17:20:52 -0800, Junghee Lee wrote:
> Dear members,
> 
> One of students asks me the questions about "wabi-sabi."
> 
> In the Korean aesthetic realm, is there a concept similar to that of 
> the Japanese aesthetic paradigm "wabi-sabi"? If so, what is the 
> Korean term for this concept?  
> 
> He said he noticed when he visited Korea, the intentional qualities 
> of "imperfection, impermanence, and incompleteness," or "beauty at 
> the edge of nothingness." 
> 
> He asks "From what era/age does it originate?"  "Is the origin 
> Chinese, or does it have indigenous Korean roots?"
> 
> Please let me know the answers to these.
> 
> Thank you.
> 
> Best wishes,.
> 
> Junghee Lee
> -- 
> Junghee Lee
> Professor of Art History
> School of Art and Design
> Portland State University
> P. O. Box 751
> Portland, OR  97207-0751
> U. S. A.
> leeju at pdx.edu

--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreanstudies.com