|
Kangjin County, South Jeolla Province is swarming with visitors during the summer vacation. Last year more than 700,000 people flocked to the county, which has a population of over 40,000. What makes Kangjin such a magnet for tourists is Koryo Celadon, the magnificent, mysteriously hued pottery that is being made again in the place where it originated after a hiatus of 600 years.
The celadon sites in Kangjin County produced celadon ware for 500 years, from the ninth to the 14th century, and nine villages with tile-kilns are protected cultural properties. Koryo Celadon disappeared as the technology for making it declined in the late Koryo dynasty (918-1392). But in 1978, the Kangjin County administration managed to restore the technology and has sponsored a festival to keep it alive every summer since.
 |
|
Foreign students make celadon at last year¡¯s Celadon Culture Festival.
|
 |
|
The 10th Kangjin Celadon Cultural Festival this year runs from July 30 to Aug. 7. Visitors can learn about the outstanding craft both theoretically and practically, looking at outstanding objects at the museum and then taking a turn at making celadon themselves. The latter has proved the most popular part of the festival, especially among visitors from abroad ? so much so that a special day has been set aside for them on Aug. 5.
Cho Eun-jeong, an art and culture researcher, says Koryo celadon was an internationally competitive high-tech product no less than today¡¯s semiconductors, a high-end product to which ordinary people had limited access, and whose production was controlled by the royal family and aristocracy.
 |
|
Scarecrows clad in the Korean Navy uniforms for the time of the Japanese invasion in 1592 stand guard along the coast as part of the Celadon Culture Festival.
|
|
|
Celadon originated in China but was refined in Korea. Koreans started making celadon during the Shilla period in the late 9th century in cities on the southwest coast such as Gangjin and Buan. But production reached its prime in the 12th century in the Koryo period, when it achieved a creativity and sophistication surpassing the Chinese product. After that, the art gradually declined as officially licensed craftsmen scattered across the country in the later Koryo period, and was displaced by the Punchung porcelain and white porcelain favored during the Chosun period.
The originality of the Koryo celadon lies in its coloring and unique inlay technique. How the distinct bluish color was achieved remains a mystery, as many fans around the globe will confirm. The inlay technique originated in Egypt and came to the Korean Peninsula by way of Central Asia and China.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
|
