[KS] Revisiting GARDENS in Korea

[Frank Hoffmann]

Hello Michael:

Does it surprise you that I see no need to stretch my brain to agree 
with your statements below AS WELL AS with that Koreana article? If I 
had been the editor I'd probably have asked the author to rephrase that 
sentence where he talks about how they kept "their yards clean and free 
of even the smallest pebble or blade of grass." But I know how it got 
there.

Before that--let me say that I think the author writes nothing else 
that would not 100% concur with your insights below. See, the 
revolution here is that the argumentation does not follow the usual 
Japanesque logic (build upon Japanese aesthetics and cultural 
experiences) but that there is an actual *alternative model* based on 
traditional Korean aesthetics and cultural experiences. We first had 
the Chinese model that I would call a literary scholar model as it is 
indeed mostly based in literature, on the Chinese Classics with their 
rigid, parallel argument AND sentence structures (八股文). I miss, by 
the way, any art historian having noted that, or at least written about 
it. But when you study early modern Korean aesthetics in literature and 
the visual arts and see what exactly starts to change at that point: 
that is it! Exactly that starts to disappear. And sometimes it really 
is only when something disappears that you understand it was at the 
center of a model. Anyway, after that it took the entire colonial 
period, well, at least till the late 1930s, until a Japanese aesthetic 
model was even understood. Something is understood when people start to 
do more than just imitating it, when they actively play with it (on 
their on terms). Liberation made for very little change there, neither 
in the North nor in the South. The 40s, 50s, 60s are highly 
all-Japanesque, and that goes on and on. That little touristy article 
here is so interesting because it breaks with this imitation culture. 
It does two important things that lead to a third: (a) it actually 
describes the reality of space in front of or between buildings rather 
than describing an idealized, imported model (with one exception, 
coming to that in a moment), and (b) it introduces a simple terminology 
and creates a clear structural model based on the Korean (and not 
Japanese or Chinese) reality. Doing that again leads to (c) the 
acceptance and appreciation of Korean culture as is, without the 
strange taste of Wasabi in your Kalbit'ang. 

I should add that those writing about Korean architecture and space 
coming from an architectural school never really were all to keen on 
using Japanese models, simply because their technical training tells 
them that when a line is not straight we call it curve. Ten Tan'gun 
books would not change that. Art historians, historians, all kind of 
hobbyists much easier become drug addicts. I had a project (didn't 
realize, still may later), and one of the authors had fascinated me 
because that author had written a text on a specific period of art in 
Korea just like an architect would describe a building, or like maybe 
the description of a city's wastewater system by an engineer--without 
any emotions, overstatements, romatications, nationalist assumptions, 
attestations of talent or genius, with no ideological games. I loved 
it! But than, that was done at a Western university, and once I saw the 
draft, the author was long back in Korea, there were all these many 
small changes in style, all those little changes that "adjusted" the 
text to the climate and pressures in Korea. It now reads smooth and 
sweet like caramel melting on your tongue and could have been published 
in a place like _Koreana_ without further edits. It is completely 
useless now. In this case there was not even an obvious change of the 
theoretical model. It was just a change of the language being used.  

For those already sharpening their knives, please think twice, this is 
NOT some essentialist argument! I am absolutely not trying to say that 
there were no important Chinese or Japanese influences on Korean 
culture and am not attempting to even evaluate such--none of that. I am 
just saying that the explanatory *models* used when discussing "Korean 
gardens" were mimicking Japanese ones, and thus they all made Korea 
look like a cross-dressed pimp (sorry to the academics here). So, yes, 
forgetting about "Korean gardens" as a term and to start talking about 
"yards rather than gardens" or "architecture, yards, gardens, 
space"--that is a good start out of that 八股文 parallel shadow 
aesthetics: Korea has just soooo much more to offer!

Now the exception: Michael, you are of course completely right about 
that quoted sentence: "They tamped down the earth and kept their yards 
clean and free of even the smallest pebble or blade of grass." He still 
clinches on in that sentence to that Japanesque idealization, no doubt. 
This "absoluteness" of "even the smallest pebble" is a complete 
bogus--which you also find in countless K-Pop movies, by the way. 
That's a flaw, and it does nit fit into the logic of his arguments. 
There is another on page seven when he mentions the "geometrically 
symmetric gardens of Europe" as to represent how European gardens look 
like, which of course only represents half of the picture or less. That 
is again that not necessarily simplistic but certainly antique 八股文 
structure. That is somewhat gross, and also another idealization 
through reductionism again. Then again, this is a tourist magazine, and 
that seems the stylistic law here.


Best,
Frank


On Sat, 19 Oct 2013 16:32:46 -0700 (PDT), Michael Pettid wrote:
> Hello Frank, 
> 
> I am not sure my own studies would lead me to conclude the same as 
> the "Koreana" article.  What I have found is that the aesthetic of 
> the ChosOn period in regards to gardens/ courtyard/ madang is that 
> the incorporation of nature--especially what was there--was really 
> important in the overall construction of a house/ garden.  Certainly 
> there were stamped-down spots for doing mundane tasks like drying 
> peppers or the like, but there was also the idea that the home opened 
> to the madang.  The flow of that to the house was really an important 
> part of the overall feel for a home.  Vegetable gardens seem to have 
> been present in upper status homes--and near to the cooking areas--so 
> I would guess that all manner of vegetables were  cultivated near the 
> home in the homes of lower status groups.  Fruit trees were also 
> prominent.  
> 
> I think most telling is the construction of the premodern house: the 
> openness of the maru (wooden porches) to the madang seem to indicate 
> a very close relation to the house and the madang.  Stamped down 
> areas with nary a pebble do not really play to this particular 
> aesthetic in my opinion.  
> 
> Just my thoughts.
> 
> Michael
> 
> Michael J. Pettid
> Professor of Premodern Korean Studies
> Department of Asian and Asian American Studies
> Director, Translation, Research and Instruction Program
> Binghamton University
> 607.777.3862
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Saturday, October 19, 2013 5:13 PM, Frank Hoffmann 
> <hoffmann at koreanstudies.com> wrote:
> Oh hey, is someone reading our list? Seems so to me, or just … f i n a 
> l l y … a turn of thought and approach?:
> You sure recall the interesting debate we had on Korean gardens several 
> months back. I was just looking for a completely different topic and 
> accidentally ended up at the index page of the tourist magazine 
> _Koreana_, probably the latest issue (Autumn 2013). It's special 
> feature is "Yards and Gardens" and I was positively surprised at what I 
> read at the beginning of the first article in there, by Han Kyung-koo, 
> a cultural anthropologist at SNU:
> 
> 
http://koreana.or.kr/ebook/viewer.asp?fcs_mid=0000999&viewer=undefined&page=0
> 
> Q U O T E :
> "Traditionally, when Koreans build their homes, they did not make any 
> specific effort to cultivate the elaborate gardens for which their 
> neighbors, the Chinese and the Japanese, are known. This was of course 
> true for the common people, but even the wealthy and powerful generally 
> did not plant anything in the front yards of their homes, however 
> grand. They tamped down the earth and kept their yards clean and free 
> of even the smallest pebble or blade of grass. [… NOTE about a few 
> *exceptions* like Soswaewŏn…] Most Koreans seemed to keep their yards 
> neat and tidy rather than maintaining large, attractive gardens."
> 
> You see where to the journey goes from this quote already.
> The articles title is therefore: "Yards rather than Gardens"
> 
> Twenty years late, but thanks anyway -- nice to see.
> 
> ……….
> 
> Unrelated: I have reason to believe that my message with subject line 
> "SOCIALIST SURREALISM" was not received by most subscribers, probably 
> because some terms in there did trigger our computers to decide that it 
> is inappropriate. (Computers are always a little behind, one must 
> know.) Here is the posting in the archives: 
> 
http://koreanstudies.com/pipermail/koreanstudies_koreanstudies.com/2013-October/010644.html
> 
> Best,
> Frank
> 
> --------------------------------------
> Frank Hoffmann
> http://koreanstudies.com
> 

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