Korean art shares aesthetic concepts, motifs, techniques, and forms with the art of China and Japan, yet it has developed its own distinctive style. The beauty and strength of Korean art lies in its simplicity, spontaneity, and harmony with nature. Korean art's basic trend has been naturalistic, already evident in the Three Kingdoms period (c. 57 bce–668 ce). Korean artists favored the beauty of raw materials, like natural wood grains, and were unconcerned with mechanical perfection, bringing out the inherent characteristics of their materials. Simplicity was applied to shape and decorative motifs, restricting the intervention of the human hand to a minimum. Korean art avoids extremes, favoring gentle curves and slopes over sharp angles and lines, creating an overall gentle and mellow effect with fluent lines and quiet inner harmony.

What are some traditional forms of Korean art?

Korean art, influenced by China and Japan, distinguishes itself through a focus on simplicity, spontaneity, and harmony with nature. Traditional forms include: * Painting Traditional Korean painting evolved under the influence of both Japanese and European styles. * Calligraphy Ancient Koreans adopted Chinese characters and mirrored Chinese styles in their calligraphy. * Pottery Korean pottery includes earthenware, stoneware, and porcelain. Korean celadons, known for their glaze and inlaid decoration, exemplify this craft. * Sculpture Stone sculpture and pagodas took on unique forms during the Koryŏ period (918–1392). Though sculpture declined in quantity and quality compared to the Unified Silla period, there was a surge of naturalism. * Performing Arts Traditional performances include masked dances and pansori, a solo singer-dancer accompanied by drumming.

How is Korean painting different from painting in other countries?

Korean painting, while sharing motifs and techniques with Chinese and Japanese art, distinguishes itself through simplicity, spontaneity, and harmony with nature. Favoring the unadorned beauty of raw materials, Korean artists traditionally aimed to minimize human intervention, often using a single, subtle motif to enhance the white background. Unlike the extreme lines and garish colors sometimes seen in Chinese art, Korean art avoids extremes, preferring gentle curves and mellow effects. During the Chosŏn dynasty, Korean painters developed a "true-view landscape" style, depicting Korean scenery and daily life with realism, marking a distinct national character in their art.

What makes Korean pottery and porcelain unique?

Korean pottery is unique because of its inlaid decoration beneath the glaze, particularly in celadons, which distinguishes it from typical Chinese celadons. The designs are incised into the clay and filled with black and white slip, showcasing floral and bird patterns. During the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910), Korean wares, though rougher than Chinese Ming and Qing pieces, display magnificent decoration. Their forms differ distinctly, featuring lobed shapes inspired by melons, unique pear-shaped bottles, and rugged, asymmetrical jars with twisted rope handles. Painting in brownish-black under a celadon glaze and the use of sgraffito are also characteristic.

How did Buddhism influence Korean art?

Buddhism's introduction to Korea in 372 CE spurred an artistic boom during the era of the Three Kingdoms. Accepted first by the court and then by the people, the religion became a central theme in Korean art until the 15th century. Buddhist sculpture began around the 5th century, with surviving pieces influenced by Chinese sculpture. During the Unified Silla period (668–935), Buddhist images and pagodas of granite were produced, and bronze work saw advancements, especially in temple bells and Buddhist statues. Though Buddhism declined during the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910), Buddhist images were made of clay and plaster on wood.

How has Korean art changed in modern times?

Modern Korean art has evolved significantly, especially during and after the Japanese occupation (1910-1945). Traditional Korean painting, initially led by figures like Cho Sŏk-chin and An Chung-shik, was influenced by the Qing period's Southern style. By the 1930s, Japanese and European influences led to changes, with the Japanese inaugurating an annual exhibition in 1922 to promote a new academic style for Korean artists. Despite resistance from traditionalists, the Japanese impact was undeniable. After World War II, artists such as Kim Ki-ch’ang, Pak Nae-hyŏn, and Pak No-su adopted a modern mode of expression, showcasing bold compositions, colors, and abstract qualities in their work. Western art introduced realistic depiction and the idea of art as a dedicated career. Modern painting then developed in two streams: Western-style painting and Eastern-style painting using traditional or colored ink. In the mid-1950s, the Informel movement embraced Western abstract art's spontaneity, while the 1970s saw Monochrome Art seeking a truly Korean art through calm, meditative harmony. During the 1980s, the Minjung Misul ("People’s Art") movement explored social themes linked to political protests.

Korean art

Images

Map showing the Korean Peninsula around AD 400 during the Three Kingdoms period, with territories of Koguryo in the north, Paekche in the southwest, Silla in the southeast, and Kaya in the south-central region. Key mountain ranges and major settlements are labeled, and modern international boundaries are outlined.

Pagoda of Jeongrimsa Temple in Buyeo, South Korea

An Kyŏn: Dream Journey to the Peach Blossom Land

At a Glance

Korean art summary

Korean art

Written by

Won-Yong KimAll

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History

General characteristics

The art produced by peoples living in the peninsula of Korea has traditionally shared aesthetic concepts, motifs, techniques, and forms with the art of China and Japan. Yet it has developed a distinctive style of its own. The beauty of Korean art and the strength of its artists lay in simplicity, spontaneity, and a feeling of harmony with nature.

The basic trend of Korean art through the ages has been naturalistic, a characteristic already evident as early as the Three Kingdoms period (c. 57 bce–668 ce) but fully established by the Unified, or Great, Silla (Korean: Shinla) period (668–935). The traditional attitude of accepting nature as it is resulted in a highly developed appreciation for the simple and unadorned. Korean artists, for example, favoured the unadorned beauty of raw materials, such as the natural patterns of wood grains. The Korean potter was characteristically unconcerned about mechanical perfection of his surfaces, curves, or shapes. His concern was to bring out the inherent or natural characteristics of his materials and the medium. Potters, therefore, were able to work unselfconsciously and naturally, producing wares of engaging simplicity and artistic distinctiveness.

Simplicity was applied not only to economy of shape but also to the use of decorative motifs and devices. The intervention of the human hand is restricted to a minimum in Korean art. A single stem of a flower, for instance, may be drawn in a subtle shade of blue on the side of a white porcelain vase or bottle, but never merely from a desire to fill an empty space. The effect is rather to enlarge the white background.

The avoidance of extremes is another characteristic tradition in Korean art. Extreme straightness of line was disliked as much as extreme curvilinearism. The straight bold contour of a Song dynasty (960–1279) Chinese bowl becomes a graceful, modest curve in a Korean bowl of the Koryŏ period (918–1392). The sharply curving Chinese roof is modified in Korean architecture into a gently sloping roof. Sharp angles, strong lines, steep planes, and garish colours are all avoided. The overall effect of a piece of Korean art is generally gentle and mellow. It is an art of fluent lines. What is most striking is not the rhythm so much as the quiet inner harmony.

Stylistic and historical development

The formative period

Both archaeological and linguistic evidence indicates that the Korean people originally spread into the Korean peninsula from Siberia by way of Manchuria. Prehistoric sites dating from the Paleolithic and Neolithic periods are found throughout the peninsula.

Sporadic Chinese influence on Korean culture began in the late Neolithic Period, but the influence intensified with the establishment in 108 bce of colonies of the Han empire in northwestern Korea. The best known of these was Nangnang (Chinese: Lelang), near P’yŏngyang. From this Chinese centre of culture, iron smelting and advanced techniques of pottery making, such as the use of a potter’s wheel and closed kiln, spread across the peninsula.

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The earliest Neolithic potteries, produced in the 6th millennium bce, are flat-bottomed wares decorated with raised horizontal lines, a zigzag pattern around the rim, or horizontal rows of impressed dots or fingernail marks. In the 5th millennium bce the latter type evolved into what is known as comb-pattern pottery, which characteristically features a pointed or rounded bottom and overall geometric patterns of herringbone, meander, and concentric semicircles, produced by incised, impressed, or dragged dots and short lines. The linear, abstract tendency of these Neolithic potteries basically falls in the tradition of prehistoric Siberian art.

In the ensuing Bronze Age (c. 1000–300 bce) and Early Iron Age (c. 300–1 bce) more types of pottery of improved quality appeared. Painted pieces derived from Chinese painted pottery were found in northern Korea, while wares devoid of surface decoration were used in other areas of the peninsula. Clay, bone, or stone figurines of seated or standing shamanistic deities were produced at such northeastern sites as Musan and Kulp’o-ri, as were small clay pigs used as charms to ensure fertility and fortune. The pigs are realistically rendered, and some even have tiny holes that were used to hold real pig hairs.

Bronze mirrorBronze mirror, c. 300 bce, Early Iron Age; in the Korean Christian Museum at Soongsil University, Seoul. Diameter 21.2 cm.

It was also during this time that bronze- and iron-working centres were established in Korea. Bronze daggers, mirrors, and perforated pole finials, all ultimately of Siberian origin, were cast. The daggers are of the type widely used by the Scythian peoples of the Eurasian steppe. The mirrors were also of a non-Chinese type, with twin knobs placed a little off centre against a tightly composed, geometric design made up of finely hatched triangles. The hatched-triangle motif was widely diffused over the vast Eurasian continent all the way from Hallstatt in Austria to Minusinsk in the upper Yenisey River valley of Siberia. The design was apparently an innovation from the Huai-style mirrors of pre-Han China.

More evidence of the Siberian art tradition in prehistoric Korea can be seen in a rock-cut drawing discovered in 1970 at Pan’gudae, near the southeastern coast of South Korea. Pecked line drawings and silhouettes of animals, including whales, dolphins, tigers, wolves, and deer, are depicted on a large (8 by 2 metres), smooth vertical surface of the rock. Some of the animals have a “life line” drawn from the mouth to the anus in the so-called X-ray style of Siberian rock art. A shaman, hunters, and a fisherman are also depicted.

Korean art

General characteristics

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Stylistic and historical development

The formative period