Jocho amida nyorai who is the figure

Art of the Non-Western World

Chapter 9: Korea and Japan

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Chapter Learning Objectives

Understand the unique character of Korean and Japanese arts, cultures, and histories.

Explain the influence of China on the development of Korean and Japanese art, literature and culture and how each nation internalized these Chinese cultural elements.

Describe how the arts of each nation were impacted by the events and aftermath of the Second World War.

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Neolithic Korea (8000-1500 BCE)

The first evidence of pottery making in Korea comes from the site of Gosan-ni on Jeju-do Island, where plain and applique-decorated Yunggimun ware sherds, dating to 8000 BCE or earlier, were found.

A millennium later a new type of potter, Jeulmum meaning “comb-patterned” appeared at several sites in Korea and continued to be made until the end of the NeolithicJeulmum wares were utilitarian and have been found in pit-house excavations rather than in tombs.

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Korea, Jeulmum Conical Vessel from Amsa-dong, c. 4000 BCE

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9.1 Korea, Jeulmum Conical Vessel from Amsa-dong, c. 4000 BCE, Collection of the British Museum. Jeulmum wares were utilitarian wares that often show ancient repairs, the typical combed and punctate decoration probably had practical as well as aesthetic purposes. National Museum of Korea. Found here: https://readtiger.com/wkp/en/Korean_art. Under CC license

Around 7,000 BCE Jeulmum pottery appears on the Korean Peninsula and becomes the dominant form.

The term Jeulmum means “comb-patterned” and specifically describes a style of conical vessels decorated by combing and cord-wrapping techniques, dating from 7000 to 1500 BCE.

Jeulmum wares were utilitarian and have been found in pit-house excavations rather than in tombs.The village of Amsa-dong, one of many Jeulmum sites, was settled around 4500 BCE.

The manufacture of coiled pottery begins at that time and continues without interruption until about 1500 BCE when it ceased entirely. Typical Amsa-dong vessels are conical in shape with a pointed foot for anchoring in the coals of a cooking fire.

Repeated heating caused these low-fired wares to crack so many vessels show ancient repair holes.

Typical decoration consists of bands of punctuation and diamond-shapes around the mouth, and comb-marks in several directions on the body of the vessel.

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Three Kingdoms Period (c. 57 BCE to CE 668)

The first Korean kingdom mentioned in Chinese accounts was the Gojoseon founded by Dangun Wanggom in 2333 BCE according to legend.

The Han Chinese conquered Gojoseon in 108 BCE, and established their colony at Lelang (Liaoning Province).

Half a century later, the peninsula was divided into three states: the Kingdom of Goguryeo in the north, and those of Silla and Baekje in the south.

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Korea, Three Kingdoms, Goguryeo, Tonggou necropolis, Tomb of the Dancers, 5th century CE

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9.2 Korea, Three Kingdoms, Goguryeo, Tonggou necropolis, Tomb of the Dancers, 5th century CE. The murals on this tomb’s walls showed activities ranging from hunting to feasting that were enjoyed by the occupant during his lifetime. The views of the different activites were broken by the painted architecture of a pavillion; notice the post and bracket at the right side of the image. Dancers (closeup). Muyong Tomb, 5th century A.D. Ji'an city, Jilin province, China

According to the 12th century Samguk Sagi, the Goguyeo kingdom was founded in 37 BCE by Prince Jumong from Buyeo (Manchuria), who had fled conflicts at the royal court.

The largest of the three states, Goguryeo expanded during the reign of King Gwanggaeto (r. 391-412 CE) from northern Korea conquering most of Manchuria. Goguryeo’s strong army and cavalry enabled it to repel repeated attempts at invasion from China.

In times of peace it prospered culturally through its successive relations with Han, Sui, and Tang China, receiving knowledge of silk-making, the Chinese writing system, the potter’s wheel and climbing kiln, mural painting techniques and motifs, Buddhism, and Confucian philosophy.

Han Chinese influence on the art of Goguryeo is most evident in the decoration of a group of mural tombs located in the necropolis on the Tonggou Plain (today Ji’an, China).

Some 10,000 tombs make up the necropolis, which is located near the ancient ruins of Kuknaesong, the second capital of Goguryeo.

Several types of tombs are found in the necropolis, including stone cairns, stone-chambered tombs that are covered by earthen mounds, and large stone-pile tombs, the most famous of which is the stepped-pyramid Tomb of the General, thought to be the mausoleum of the 20th Goguryeo ruler, King Jangsu (r.413-491).

The Tomb of the Dancers is modest in scale and consists of two rooms: a small front room and a main chamber connected by a passageway. The stone walls of both rooms were covered with a plaster mix of seaweed and slaked lime and then the murals were added in the wet fresco technique.

The figures were outlined in black and then filled in with a somber palette consisting of dark red, brown, and yellow. The murals of the front room include scenes of houses and trees on the east wall and horse saddles to suggest a stable on the west.

The occupant of the tomb and two male guests, possibly monks, are depicted on the north wall. Within the main chamber are scenes of activities that the decedent enjoyed in life. The entire west wall is a hunting scene in which five bowmen on horseback chase deer and tigers through a mountainous landscape. The north wall shows the decedent enjoying a banquet while an acrobat performs the “rolling lights” act around a burning lamp.

The Tomb takes its name from the entertainment depicted on the east wall: a scene of two female and three male dancers engaged in an animated line dance in front of an attentive audience. The male dancers wear loose trousers and jackets while the women wear long robes over ballooning pants. Elsewhere on the wall musicians and singers provide accompaniment for the dancers, and servants bring out food from a pavilion to the banquet on the north wall.

In each corner of the room is a tromp l’oeil column with ornate corbeled brackets extending up to a beam at the ceiling, giving the effect of being within a pavilion looking out at the various scenes.

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Korea, King Muryeong Tomb, Geumjegwansik diadems, c. 501-523 CE, gold, 12 in. high

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9.3 Korea, King Muryeong Tomb, Geumjegwansik diadems, c. 501-523 CE, gold, 12 in (30 cm) high, Collection of the Gongju National Museum. These fragile gold ornaments would have been attached to the sides of the ruler’s black silk cap. Photo by J.T. Williams distributed under a CC BY-SA 2.0 license.

The Kingdom of Baekje was founded in 18 BCE by King Onjo, a prince of Goguryeo. Baekje was the most international of the three kingdoms having diplomatic relations with both China and Japan.

Although they adopted Buddhism in 384 CE, the Baekje kings continued to construct tumulus-style mausoleums on Mount Songsan. The most famous of these is the tomb of King Muryeong (r. 501-523 CE) and his queen, discovered in 1971.

The tomb held nearly 3,000 burial offerings including gold and silver items, Chinese celadon ceramics, and stone mirrors. Unique among the gold items in Muryeong’s tomb are a pair of diadems in the form of flowering trees with an overall flame shape. It is thought that these pieces originally would have been hooked through rings at the base of the tree trunk to the left and right sides of king’s black silk headpiece.

The two openwork ornaments, known collectively as Geumjegwansik, were found stacked one on top of the other near the ruler’s head in the tomb.

The diadems differ slightly in size; the larger measuring approximately 12x 5.5 inches, and the second being about a half inch shorter and a quarter inch narrower; both were cut from gold sheets only seven-hundredths of an inch (2 mm) thick. To increase the play of light and perhaps add an element of sound, the diadems were decorated with small gold danglers.

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Korea, Silla, Hwangnam Daechong , North Tomb, Gold Crown, 5th century CE, gold with jade jewels, 10.75 in. high

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9.4 Korea, Silla, Hwangnam Daechong , North Tomb, Gold Crown, 5th century CE, gold with jade jewels, 10.75 in. (27.30 cm), Collection of the National Museum of Korea. The elements of this crown symbolize the ruler’s role as an intermediary between the celestial and terrestrial realms. National Museum of Korea

The Silla kingdom was formed in 57 BCE when the leaders of the six confederated Saro-guk villages decided on a power-sharing plan that rotated kingship among the heads of the three strongest clans: Park, Kim, and Seok.

The arrangement continued for four centuries until the Kim established a hereditary monarchy. Silla society was highly stratified according to the “bone system.” The highest rank, from which the ruler was selected, was the “sacred bone.” To be eligible to rule an individual must have royal blood “sacred bone” on both sides of the family. On three occasions the throne passed to queens when no suitable male was available.

Until the end of the 6th century when they converted to Buddhism, the Silla kings and queens were buried in tombs constructed in their capital city of Gyeongju.

The Hwangnam Daechong mound is a double tomb with the burial of a king in the south mound and that of a queen, buried later, in the north mound. Both tombs were constructed similarly; each began with the laying out of a stone perimeter wall that defined the size of the mound. In the center of that space a log chamber was constructed for the entombment of the king.

Around the burial vault more posts were sunk into the tumulus floor to serve as stabilizing piers for the fill mass. Once the posts were in place and adjusted in height to correspond to the desired shape of the mound, stone rubble was added and then a final layer of earth.

The Silla Gold Crown excavated from the North (Queen’s) tomb of the Hwangnam Daechong is the most elaborate diadem yet found in Korea.

Prior to the adoption of Buddhism as the state religion, the Silla rulers practiced shamanism. Elements of the crown reflect those beliefs. At the center point of the crown’s gold band is a vertical element with three horizontal branches, representing the world tree or axis mundi. Flanking the tree are pairs of antler-shaped elements and two wing-like extensions.

The crown is decorated with claw-shaped jade jewels called gogok and circular gold danglers. Suspended from the side of the band, and set to frame the wearer’s face, are gold chains ornamented with gogok or with leaf-like gold elements.

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Korea, Gyeongju, Chomsongdae observatory, c. 632-647 CE, 30 ft. high

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9.5 Korea, Gyeongju, Chomsongdae observatory, c. 632-647 CE, 30 ft. (9.17 m) high. This first Asian observatory was built on the palace grounds by Queen Sondok who was keenly interested in astronomy. Photo by Zsinj distributed under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license.

One of the great Silla monarchs, Queen Sondok (r. 632-647 CE) was keenly interested in astronomy and during her reign built the Chomsondae observatory on the palace grounds in Gyeongju.

The 30-foot high, milk-bottle shaped tower sits on 17.6 foot square base made up of twelve stones arranged three to a side. These represent the four seasons and twelve months of the lunar year.

The tower rises in 27 tiers referencing the number of days required for the moon to orbit the earth as well as the Queen Sondok’s position as the 27th monarch in the line of succession. A total of 362 granite blocks were used in the construction of the cylinder; this number equals the number of days in the lunar year.

The tower was filled with gravel up to the level of the entry door to create a floor for the interior ladder up to the viewing platform. The platform is only large enough to accommodate one seated adult at a time.

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The Unified Silla (668-935 CE)

The Three Kingdoms did not coexist peacefully, frequently at war with each other until the Silla, with the assistance of Tang China, conquered the Kingdoms of Baekje (660 CE) and Goguryeo (668 CE).

However, when the victories had been achieved the Chinese refused to withdraw. Together with its recently subjugated neighbors, Silla repelled the Tang and established the Unified Silla kingdom, the first state to unite the peninsula.

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Korea, Sokkuram Grotto, Buddha, c. 750-775 CE, granite, 11 ft. high

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9.6 Korea, Sokkuram Grotto, Buddha, c. 750-775 CE, granite, 11 ft. (3.5 m) high. Stylistically, this monumental Buddha is a mix of Indian Gupta and Chinese Northern Wei elements. Photo by Richard Fabi distributed under a CC BY-SA 3.0 license.

After their conversion to Buddhism, the Silla monarchs sponsored the building of numerous Buddhist temples and shrines around their capital, believing that by doing so they would secure protective forces that would keep the city safe from attack from their enemies.

Kim Tae-song designed two of the most important Buddhist shrines of the United Silla era. Few facts are known about Kim Tae-song’s life other than he was an official in the court of King Kyongdok (r. 742-765) and that he died in 774 CE.

The two temples Sokkuram Grotto and Bulguksa were said to have been built to honor his parents in his previous and current lives respectively. Unfortunately, the original Bulguksa Temple was destroyed in the Japanese invasion of 1592. The Sokkuram Grotto, while looted of some of its sculptures during Japanese rule, fared better.

Sokkuram Grotto, located on Mt. Tohan, is a unique structure in the history of Buddhist architecture. It combines the idea of the mountain temple in its location, the rock-cut cave temple in concept, and the Indian stupa in its hemispherical form. The mountain was one of the five protective peaks surrounding the capital but its granite core made leveling a space for a mountain temple or excavating a traditional cave temple impractical.

Instead, Kim Tae-song created a built cave, using massive granite blocks to construct the chamber and entrance corridor. The stone structure was then covered with a layer of earth to give it the essence of a cave.

The site selected for the temple offered the additional problem of moisture rising from underground springs so Kim Tae-song designed a series of channels under the floor to increase air circulation and keep the chamber dry.

Sokkuram was oriented so that the rays of the sun, on the morning of the spring equinox, entering through the east doors, illuminate the Buddha statue in the center of the rotunda.

Unfortunately, the name of the sculptor who carved the Sokkuram Buddha from a single block of white granite was not recorded. The statue measures slightly more than eleven feet tall and rests on a four-foot high pedestal.

Stylistically the Sokkuram Buddha is a mix of Indian Gupta elements, such as scorpion-sting curls and fan-fold hem pleats, with Northern Wei interpretations derived from Gandharan prototypes. The Chinese influence is seen in the heavier torso and more rounded face.

The identity of the Buddha enshrined in Sokkuram is a matter of debate among scholars. As he seems to be performing the Touching the Earth Mudra, he is sometimes identified as Shakyamuni Buddha, but considering the Korean concepts of geomancy, this as gesture as one of protecting the land.

If the story of Kim Tae-song’s creation of the shrine as a memorial of filial piety is correct, then the Buddha would most likely represent Amitabha Buddha, the Buddha of the Western Paradise. Kim Tae-song’s connection to nearby Bulguksa temple offers a third possibility that the figure represents Vairocana, the Cosmic Buddha who is venerated there.

On the lower walls of the chamber are low relief figures of ten disciples and five bodhisattvas including the eleven-headed Kwanum (Avalokitshivara), associated with Amitabha Buddha. However, the figures in the niches on the upper wall are figures of devas associated with the cardinal directions and constellations, suggesting Vairocana.

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Later Three Kingdoms and Goryeo

At the end of the 9th century the peninsula was again divided into three kingdoms when Baekje and Goguryeo broke away from the Unified Silla. They formed the Later Baekje and Later Goguryeo kingdoms.

However, in 935 CE, Wang Geon usurped the throne of the Later Goguryeo, conquered Baekje and Silla, and united the peninsula under the Kingdom of Goryeo.

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The Goryeo kings were enlightened rulers, abolishing slavery, reforming the government, and promoting the arts and literature, including the writing of the first Korean histories, and the carving of the Tripitaka, a collection of woodblocks for the printing of all known Buddhist texts.

When the palace library was burned in 1126 CE, King Injong (r. 1122-1146 CE) had the casters at his royal mint adapt coin casting techniques to produce bronze type, creating the first movable metal type some three hundred years before Europeans. In 1231 the Mongols invaded Korea and the Goryeo became a vassal state of the Yuan Empire.

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Korea, Goryeo Dynasty, Maebyeong Vase with Cranes and Clouds, 13th century CE

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9.7 Korea, Goryeo dynasty, Maebyeong Vase with Cranes and Clouds, 13th century CE, stoneware with inlaid designs and celadon glaze, 11.50 in (29.2 cm) tall, Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. While celadon glazes were introduced from China, Korean potters perfected them. The inlaid cranes on this vase are auspicious symbols. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fletcher Fund 1927

Under Goryeo patronage celadon or “Chongja” ceramics reached perfection. The first celadon wares are thought to have been introduced from China with Chan Buddhism and tea. Korean celadons are high-fired, light grey or buff colored stoneware vessels coated with a feldspathic glaze that turns various shades of bluish-green when reduction fired.

Korean ceramic artists invented a number of decorative techniques for celadon that are unknown elsewhere, including reticulated openwork designs and sanggam or inlaid decoration.

The Maebyeong Vase with Cranes and Clouds is a form derived from China. This type of tall vessel with a small mouth was used for displaying a single branch of blossoming plum. The cranes and clouds, traditional symbols of longevity, decorating its surfaces look to be fluidly painted but they are actually inlaid.

Using the technique known as sanggam, the artist incised the design into vessel when the clay reached a leather-hard consistency. The excavated areas were filled with either white clay as in the cranes or reddish- brown clay that would turn black when fired as in the legs and beaks of the birds and the outlines of the clouds.

After bisque-firing, the vessel was given a transparent celadon glaze that allowed the inlaid colors to show through. Goryeo potters also used copper-oxide underglazes to add touches of red to their designs.

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Korea, Goryeo, Water Moon Avalokitesvara, 1310 CE

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9.8 Korea, Goryeo, Water Moon Avalokitesvara, 1310 CE, ink and color on silk, 16 x 9 ft. (4.8 x 2.7 m), Collection of Kagami Jinjya Temple, Karatsu, Japan. This monumental scale painting was the work of several court artists who painted it as an offering to the Bodhisattva and a request for his protection of the country. Kagami Jinjya Temple, Karatsu, Japan

Several genres of painting flourished at the cosmopolitan Goryeo court. Close relationships with Song China inspired Korean nobles to imitate their Chinese counterparts in taking up painting as a means of meditation and intellectual cultivation. Unfortunately, very few Goryeo paintings have survived to the present day. Only 160 examples are known, mostly Buddhist subjects, and a majority of those are in Japan.

A popular subject of the era was the Water Moon Avalokitesvara or Gwanseeum-bosal; thirty-eight examples are known. Among the surviving works is a monumental 16 by 9 foot silk hanging scroll in the Kagami Jinjya (Shinto) Temple in Karatsu, Japan.

The scroll was created by a team of painters working at the court of King Chungseon (r. 1308-1313), under the direction of Queen Kim. The painting depicts the Bodhisattva seated on his mountain island home of Potalaka. In his right hands he holds the blue lotus that identifies him.

In China and Korea Avalokitesvara often appears feminine since compassion was believed to be a characteristic of that gender but the Bodhisattva is capable of manifesting in any form necessary to teach a particular supplicant.

The painting is based on a story from the Flower Garland Sutra in which the youth Sudhana seeks enlightenment through visits to fifty-three great sages.

In the scroll, Sudhana is the childlike figure in the lower right who is approaching the Bodhisattva. The scroll is thought to have been commissioned as a supplication to the Bodhisattva to release Korea from Mongol domination. Not long after this scroll was painted, it was taken by marauding pirates to Japan.

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Great Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910)

The defeat of the Yuan Dynasty in 1368, also freed Korea from Mongol domination.

Despite the return of political autonomy, the Goryeo kingdom was beset with political strife, and persistent incursions by Manchus and Japanese pirates.

After repulsing Japanese mauraders, the Goryeo General Yi Seong-gye was ordered to move north and attack Ming China, but instead, he executed a coup d’état, taking the throne as King Taejo.

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Silhak Movement

In a period of less than 40 years beginning at the end of the 16th century, Korea was invaded first by the Japan and then by the Manchu Qing, who forced the Joseon into a tributary relationship.

After the invasions, the Silhak or “Practical Learning” Movement urged Koreans to look to local sources to solve the country’s economic and social problems.

Under Silhak, Korean painters were encouraged to look for indigenous subjects and scenes rather than continuing to imitate Chinese models.

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Korea, Jeong Seon, General View of Mount Geumgansan, 1734 CE

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9.10 Korea, Jeong Seon (1676-1759), General View of Mt.Geumgansan, 1734 CE, ink and color on paper, 51.5 x 37 in, (130.7 x 94.1 cm), Collection of the Ho-Am Art Museum. Inspired by the Silhak movement, Jeong painted this accurate landscape of the especially craggy Korean mountain. Ho-Am Art Museum

Jeong Seon was born into an aristocratic family and served as a local magistrate. He took up painting at the age of thirty-five and worked as an artist until his death.

Under the influence of Silhak, Jeong devised a new highly realistic approach to landscape painting, which he termed “jingyeong sansuhwa” or “true-view painting.”

True-view painting required the artist to go out into the countryside and paint directly from nature, essentially painting en plein air almost a century before the Barbizon painters in Europe.

Jeong is best known for his many ink and watercolor paintings of Mount Geumgangsan in the Taebaek range that runs along the eastern coast of the peninsula. In his famous painting of the mountain, General View of Mt Geumgansan, Jeong details in firm contour lines the thousands of Geumangangsan’s shard-like granite peaks, which erupt from verdant valleys.

Blue washes suggest mist rising from distant parts of the mountain. In a manner reminiscent of An Gyon, Jeong contrasts the large barren sharps rising on the right side of the mountain with a section on the left of softer, foliage covered peaks. Separating the two is a narrow valley in which an almost unseen Buddhist monastery is nestled.

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Korea, Shin Ka-gwon, A Scenery on Dano Day, c. 1805 CE

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9.11 Korea, Shin Ka-gwon (1758-c.1813), A Scenery on Dano Day, c. 1805, ink and color on paper, Collection of the Gansong Art Museum, Seoul. Painting under the name Hyewon, Shin focused his art on scenes of contemporary life in Korea often in a satirical manner. Gansong Art Museum, Seoul

Shin Ka-gwon commonly known as Shin Yun-bok, was also inspired by the Silhak movement to create an indigenous Korean art. Shin came from a family of court painters and he was himself a member of the Dohwaseo (government office of painting) for a time before being expelled for obscenity. His offense was in treating the upper-class yangban not as the paragons of virtue they purported to be but as fallible humans susceptible to ordinary vices.

In many of his paintings, Shin portrays the yangban enjoying the company of lower class gisaeng (female entertainers); such fraternization was considered to be extremely vulgar in Joseon society. An even greater offense was found in his drawing the women the same size as the yangban.

A Scenery on Dano Day shows women performing the rituals associated with the Dano festival. In a scene reminiscent of the story of Susannah and the Elders, the women are shown in various stages of undress as they wash their hair in iris water and rinse in the stream before redressing for the festivities.

While the women engage in these innocent activities, they are being spied on by two men, drawn smaller in scale, who are hiding behind rocks. The men have removed their hats but appear to be dressed in the white hanbok coat worn by the yangban scholars.

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Korean Art in the Modern Era

In 1910 Japan forced the last Joseon monarch to abdicate and annexed Korea, instituting a period of repressive rule that lasted until the end of World War II.

This was an especially difficult time in Korea and as a result, the arts of this era have been little studied.

The years after World War II saw the revival of traditional ink painting and celadon in Korea as well as efforts to create a fusion of the traditional media with Western expressive modes such as abstraction.

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In 1910 Japan forced the abdication of the last Joseon monarch and annexed Korea. Japanese rule was repressive.

The Korean language was prohibited, farms and businesses were appropriated by the Japanese, and Korean traditional culture and arts were suppressed.

During the occupation, the only art schools open to Koreans were those in Japan.

This was an especially difficult time in Korea and as a result, the arts of this era have been little studied. The years after World War II saw the revival of traditional ink painting and celadon in Korea as well as efforts to create a fusion of the traditional media with Western expressive modes such as abstraction.

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Korea, Yi Kwae-dae, Self-portrait in Traditional Coat, 1948-1949

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9.12 Korea, Yi Kwae-dae (1913-1970), Self-portrait in Traditional Coat, 1948-1949, oil on canvas, Collection of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea. In this self-portrait Yi expresses his search for a Korean identity after having grown up during the Japanese occupation. Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea

Yi Kwae-dae was born during the Japanese occupation. After high school in Seoul, he studied art at the Imperial Art School in Japan, where he specialized in Yôga or Western painting.

Returning to Korea in the 1930s he organized the New Artists’ Association, which like the Silhak movement encouraged artists to produce works that were authentically Korean instead of following Japanese styles. Such ideas did not find favor with the Japanese colonial authorities.

After the war in 1945 when Korea was divided by US and Soviet forces, Yi Kwae-dae protested the partitioning of his country. His activism and his brother’s defection to the north put him under intense police scrutiny. When the Korean War broke out, he was arrested and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp. In 1953, he defected to North Korea.

Yi’s Self-portrait in Traditional Coat was painted after his brother’s defection when his loyalty was being repeatedly questioned. In it Yi Kwae-dae seems to be making a statement that goes beyond conflicting ideologies and the politics of partition.

He looks directly at us, clench-jawed and determined, holding his palette and brushes like a shield as though he is making a statement that his allegiance is to Korean art. He wears a fedora and a traditional hanbok, while in the fauvist colored landscape behind him Korean women walk through the countryside carrying water pots and food baskets on their heads.

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Korea, Song Soo-nam, Summer Trees, 1979

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9.13 Korea, Song Soo-nam (1938-2013), Summer Trees, 1979, ink on paper, 25.6 x 40.5 in.(65 x 103 cm) Collection of the British Museum. Song’s paintings exude the inner tranquility and spirituality that he felt were in danger of being lost in the modern world with its focus on technology and gadgets. The British Museum

Song Soo-nam was also born during the Japanese occupation. He attended Hongik University, where he began as a student of Western art but in his senior year switched to traditional ink painting.

He was one of the founders of the Sumukhwa or “Oriental Ink Movement,” which advocated for the revival of traditional monochrome ink painting as a contemporary medium.

In Summer Trees broad vertical strokes of diluted ink bleed and blend into each other, creating a monochromatic curtain that stops short of the bottom of the page to suggest a shallow clearing at the edge of a dense forest.

A few abrupt strokes, added when the paper was dry, define trunks along the front edge of the grove. Summer Trees exudes a quiet meditative spirituality, recalling the long tradition of Daoist landscape painting.

Yet at the same time its subtle blending of blacks and grays evokes Western color field paintings, particularly Morris Louis’ Veil Series of the 1950s. Indeed, many of Song’s pieces, while rooted in tradition, have an almost abstract quality.

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Neolithic Japan (12,000- 300 BCE)

The Neolithic begins in Japan around 12,000 BCE with the “Jomon” period, named for the distinctive “cord-marked” patterns on this earliest Japanese pottery.

The earliest Joman wares found in Aomori Prefecture in northern Honshu date to 14,500 BCE, making them the second oldest ceramics after China.

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Japan, Jomon Flame Ware Vessel, c. 2500 BCE

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9.14 Japan, Jomon Flame Ware Vessel, c. 2500 BCE, Collection of the Tokyo National Museum. This Jomon flame ware vessel is so dramatically ornamented around the rim with flame-like appendages that it could only be intended for ritual or funerary use. Photo by Daderot distributed under a CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Declaration license.

Jomon ceramics are one of the longest-lived pottery traditions in history, continuing to evolve over the course of 13,000 years before ceasing around 1500 BCE.

All of their pots were built up by coiling and then the surfaces smooth by scraping; they were often wrapped with cords to slow down the drying process.

While many of the Jomon forms are practical utilitarian wares, some are so dramatically ornamented as to be impractical for most purposes.

Beginning around 2500 BCE, the Jomon produced a type of pottery known as “Flame Ware” for the often flame-like flanges around the rims of vessels.

Unlike earlier conical or round bottom forms, flame ware vessels generally had flat bottoms, and cylindrical bodies. The sculptural elaboration of these vessels may indicate they were intended for ritual purposes.

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The Yayoi Period (900 BCE – 300CE)

The first waves of settlers from Korea, the ancestors of the Japanese, began arriving in western Kyushu around 900 BCE.

These people, named Yayoi for the Tokyo street where their ceramics were found.

The Yayoi period was one of rapid technological and social advancement as these new settlers brought rice cultivation, bronze casting, iron-working, raised-floor architecture, and Shintoism.

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Japan, Yayoi, Dotaku, c. 1-100 CE, Bronze, 43.50 in. high

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9.15 Japan, Yayoi, Dotaku, c. 1-100 CE, Bronze, 43.50 in. (110.5 cm), Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. These bells come in a range of sizes from small to large and are thought to have been inspired by Korean bells. They are often found buried in caches on hillsides. The bells generally lack clappers and some are too thin to have resonated. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1918

The Yayoi brought both bronze casting and iron-working to Japan. They made their tools and other utilitarian items out of iron or stone, reserving bronze almost exclusively for ritual objects including mirrors, swords, and bells called dotaku.

Dotaku are emblematic of the Yayou Period. The earliest dotaku were quite small, four inches high and were cast using two-piece stone mold.

Larger dotoku, up to 51 inches were cast in fired-clay molds. Dotaku do not have clappers nor do they appear to have been struck in the manner of Chinese bells.

It is not entirely clear how they were used as most of the more than 400 that have been discovered were found buried far from habitation sites; they were often buried in pairs or even-numbered caches, sometimes with bronze weapons.

The bodies of dotaku are typically divided horizontally into two, three, or more registers, crossed in the center by a vertical band. The resulting compartments might be undecorated, have linear slash and cross-hatching patterns, or have designs of animals—primarily deer, but also turtles, fish, birds, lizards, and dragonflies, or they have human figures, generally shown in profile.

Based on descriptions in the Wei Zhi of the use of bells in Korean rice planting and harvesting festivals, it has been suggested that the Japanese dotaku may have had a similar agricultural function.

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The Kofun Period (250-538 CE)

This period takes its name from the more than 30,000 kofun or “old tombs” built during the era.

The tombs come in a range of sizes and shapes: round, square, octagonal and combination forms such as the massive keyhole-shaped tombs.

The ability to command the large numbers of laborers required to build these large tombs was facilitated by the uniting of many the southern Honshu and the Kyushu clans under the leadership of the Imperial Yamato government.