Thursday, November 20, 2014

Opening of Hangeul Museum

And yet another museum is opening in Seoul ... this new one beside Seoul's largest museum, the National Museum of Korea, but then the Hangeul alphabet, which the museum is dedicated to, is intimately related to the national identity of Korea so its location is most appropriate. 

Already within Seoul, the listing of museums in Seoul according to Wikipedia is 4 national museums, 9 municipal museums, and around 63 private museums. However, according to a brochure I picked up a few years ago at a tourist booth, the listing was closer to 300 museums in Seoul alone. Museums that I have either been to or thought sounded interesting and were not on Wikipedia's list are a shaman museum, a comic book museum, an old newspaper/magazine museum, and a baseball card museum. And sadly, the Tibet Museum listed in the Wikipedia list was closed about two years ago, according to my anthropology friend interested in the various sects of Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism being one of them. As for museums within South Korea, Wikipedia lists 123. 

This museum promises to take the visitor beyond just hearing that Hangeul was invented and promulgated by King Sejong the Great. The museum seems to be a historical journey from its creation and promulgation to how, over the centuries, its development impacted Korean society. I'm definitely interested!

The following article was taken from The Korean Herald, October 8, 2014:

Celebrating the beauty of Hangeul

Museum opens amid growing artistic, cultural interest in Korean alphabet

Hangeul, the writing system for the Korean language, has always been a source of pride for Koreans. So much so that they mark Oct. 9 as Hangeul Day, a national holiday celebrating its creation more than 500 years ago. 

Efforts to cherish King Sejong’s great gift to the people went further this year, resulting in a brand new museum dedicated solely to the alphabet. 

Hangeul museum 

The National Hangeul Museum opens to the public Thursday, with the stated mission of raising the public’s understanding of its language. 

It is also starting a month-long festival celebrating the 24 letters ― 14 consonants and 10 vowels ― that make up Hangeul. 

“Hangeul is the No. 1 linguistic and cultural asset passed down to us. The National Hangeul Museum aims to promote its value and extend it beyond the linguistic realm by promoting the use of Hangeul as a motif in art and culture,” Moon Young-ho, the museum’s inaugural president, told reporters last month during a press preview. 

“Hangeul is not just a writing system for our language. It’s a cultural medium,” he added. 


The main exhibition hall of the National Hangeul Museum. (The National Hangul Museum)
Located near the National Museum of Korea in Yongsan, the museum’s building is an architectural embodiment of the philosophy behind the alphabet ― heaven (.), earth (ㅡ) and man (ㅣ). It has four floors ― three above ground and one below. 

Nearly 10,000 Hangeul-related artifacts are housed there. Some of them have been newly discovered by the museum, according to Hong Yun-pyo who led the preparatory committee for the museum. 

“At least 10 of them deserve national treasure designations,” he said. 

Among the highlights of the museum’s inaugural exhibition are an original copy of “Hunminjeongeum Haerye,” a commentary on “Hunminjeongeum,” the original promulgation of the alphabet on loan from the privately run Gansong Art Museum; “Yongbieocheonga,” the first work written in Hangeul; the oldest Korean typewriter in existence and a cache of letters handwritten in Korean by King Jeongjo, a Joseon era ruler who took the throne some 350 years after King Sejong the Great. 

The oldest Korean typewriter in existence,
invented by Song Ki-ju in 1933
(The National Hangul Museum)
The third floor of the museum is dedicated to children and foreign visitors, with various multimedia devices and programs designed to help them understand the basics of Hangeul. 

The museum is located near Exit 2 of Ichon Station on Seoul’s Line No. 4. It closes on Mondays. Admission is free. For details, visit www.hangeul.go.kr 


Hangeul meets art, culture 

For some Korean artists, Hangeul is not just an alphabet. It’s their source of artistic inspiration. 

Many years after designer Lie Sang-bong’s signature Hangeul-themed fashion show, the Korean characters are now more widely used as a design motif in everyday life in Korea ― from Starbucks tumblers to T-shirts. 


This T-shirt is a collaborative work of up-and-coming fashion designer Nohant and actor Yoo Ah-in. (Nohant)

Earlier this year, up-and-coming designer Nohant and actor Yoo Ah-in jointly released a line of T-shirts, featuring a mix of Korean and English letters, which became an instant sensation. 

A stage musical currently running at Theater Yong inside the National Museum of Korea tells the story of King Sejong and all the obstacles he faced within the court as he pushed to create a writing system for Korean. 

The “Deep Rooted Tree” is based on the best-selling novel of the same title by Lee Jeong-myeong. A TV drama adaptation of the book ran in 2011 on local channel SBS, winning both public and critical acclaim. 

The musical raises the curtain Thursday and runs until Oct. 18. Ticket prices range from 40,000 won to 80,000 won. For details, call (02) 523-0986. 

By Lee Sun-young (milaya@heraldcorp.com)


Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Straw-Plant Handicraft Museum

The Museum of Korean Straw and Plants Handicrafts has been in operation for over 20 years, and since 2001 has been in Hyehwa-dong. The founder, Byung Sun In, has a passion for straw handicrafts and culture and has been doing intense research on Korea’s handicraft straw-plant culture for the past 35+ years.  It is because of her passion and research interest that this museum exists. The museum houses over 100,000 items in the permanent collection made of straw-plant fibers or for household related to such production.

What is straw-plant culture?


Since ancient times, straw and plant have been the oldest and most widely used materials by mankind. Although history doesn’t show a Straw and Plant Age like the Stone or Iron Ages, in prehistoric settings straw and plant were essential for building, tool-making, carrying, providing shelter and comfort and for innumerable other domestic devices. Straw—derived not only from rice stems, but also wheat, barley and Indian millet—made a number of essential daily tools like the straw roof, the entrance of a village, baskets for carrying a variety of things like dirt and farm produce, winnows, scrubbers, straw cushions, and even pillows. Straw was also versatile as a building material as an element of brick making.


The museum has a collection of 16 kinds of knots for making the every day tools.
The outcome of using various types of straw and plant fibers, some with or without plant-based dyes,
is apparent in these beautiful bags for decoration, carrying or storing.
Containers and handbags for storage of delicate items like make-up or for a purse or "lunch box"
as is evidenced by the containers in the background.

Traditional straw shoes were another essential, and as many as 10 pairs of shoes were generally made for each person each winter so that as soon as one pair wore out, which took about 10 days, another pair could be slipped on. Ladies took more care with their shoe embellishments and they wore “flower shoes” made more painstakingly of hemp, ginseng, cattail or rushes dyed in colorful water. Shoes were not only for the seasons but were made for various occasions, especially for those who held positions in society. For examples, the upper class wore delicate hemp cord sandals, chief mourners had “mourning shoes” and their benefactors wore “horsehair shoes.

The traditional straw thatched houses used the largest amount of straw in the past. While the upper class had rooves of tiles, the lower class made rooves of rice straw. And for those too poor to afford rice straw, plants like cogon and eulalia grass were used. Constructing a straw house and thatching it was a communal affair as it was difficult to do such a task alone. First the walls were constructed with piled thatch and then the thatched roof was put on. This task had to be done every year or two for the house to remain functional.

The large round mat is over 50 years old, but most straw items in the museum or much more recently made.
Everything in the museum is hand-crafted. 
More items. Of particular interest to our group taking the first English tour of the museum is the urine pot. It is the rounded metal pot with odd hole in the side (for dumping the urine). The lowest class of people would travel from house to house and collect the urine for a tiny amount of money and then sell it to farmers as fertilizer. Their carts royally stunk, but though they were avoided because of their ripe smell, those workers were an essential part of society.
Pillows on the right, decorated by shiny dyed rice-fiber artwork (more pictured on the left). Rice fibers were split open to reveal their shiny interior; they were dyed and cut to size and carefully woven into intricate designs. Giving such a pillow to a woman's in-laws was a  respectful gift, which revealed the industriousness of the daughter-in-law and her filial respect to her elders by relationship.

Straw also played a big part for religious and recreational occasions. For example, the golden twisted straw rope on the front gate or village entrance was used in religious ceremonies or to announce the birth of a child. Masks made of straw or plant fibers were various: basket mask, winnow mask, zodiac mask—each created to be used for certain festival events. Also a heavy twist of rice straw or arrowroot vine rope for making a giant game of tug-of-war (man against woman, or uptown against downtown) was commonly played on lunar celebrations; women were often secretly helped to win in this event as it was believed to bring them luck. Straw ropes could also be used as a warning to people. For example, putting charcoal, Korean paper and pine branches along with a straw rope woven in counter-clockwise twists at the village entrance meant “do not enter”; this rope was appropriately called the “left twisted straw” and referring to it as such was a euphemism for “beware”.


Very well crafted! Not sure its purpose though -- traditional or merely as modern decoration?
A raincoat in the background, often made of cattail fibers, and in the foreground,  a very clever piece of artwork. I didn't ask if this was a child's toy or maybe just a modern creation, but it's of high-quality weave and strength.

Plant fibers had a wider variety of uses than rice straw—for examples, a mat of sedge or cogon, Korean paper made of peeling the mulberry tree, and the raincoat made from cattail. And many of the above mentioned tools could easily be substituted with a wide variety of plant fiber varieties in abundance throughout the peninsula.


Obviously, rice and plant fibers have played an essential role in the social and cultural development of Korea. Non-essentials like crafts and stylized artistic pieces were a part of many homes, particularly in the wealthier homes. However, there was a large decline in the need for straw and plant fibers when materials like iron and wood started to be widely used. However, in later centuries, the straw-plant culture made a resurgence, and now in modern times, contemporary artists are reviving the artform of using straw and plant and children are commonly given classes in straw or plant fiber crafts.

The museum has a room for craft-making also, and a much larger display than this was on shelves for the public to enjoy looking at and to even sign up for classes ... although the classes are primarily aimed at children.
Since this was the first English tour ever given at the museum (on October 15, 2014), all those who participated in the tour were given materials to make a "zipul" (straw, 지풀) grasshopper house, an item that children often used in ages gone past. Even though in the upper right-hand corner it looks like there's a hole at the bottom of the house, grasshoppers are known to jump up, not down, and so they do not escape from the house.

Much of the above information was taken from the website for the museum.


Sunday, November 9, 2014

The DMZ (Imjingak) and Tunnel #3

My cousin came to Korea for the first time and I offered to show him around on his single free day, but when the opportunity came for him to go to the DMZ instead of seeing local sites in Seoul, he was ready to jump at the chance, provided I could tag along. Yup, no problem. So off we went with another guest lecturer and their team coordinator. First we went to Tunnel #3, aka "tunnel of aggression" so named by the South Koreans after they discovered the tunnel in 1978. The North Koreans have tried to make the tunnel look like a coal shaft but according to my geologist cousin, hard granite can in no way substitute for coal. The whole time my cous was in the tunnel, he was scanning continually for any lose rocks that he could take back to the states and examine. I tried to find some too and when we got back up to the surface, our hands were blackened from the coal dust painted on the granite tunnel walls to make them seem like an abandoned coal mine shaft. 

Source 

Before entering the tunnel, we saw a very poignant passage on the wall concerning the Korean War: "The Korean War gave a great wound to our whole national resulting in 6 million casualties in 3 years and 1 month. [Here is] the truce line holding the pain of our nation's division and sorrows of brothers who died bleeding."

Dorasan, the last subway stop to North Korea


Dorasan is really not the last subway or train stop to North Korea, but one day it will be. Currently,  it is the last stop for four daily trains from Seoul before one must turn around and go back. However, back on December 11, 2007, freight trains started traveling north onward to North Korea to transport materials needed at the Kaesong Industrial Region and on the return they carried manufactured goods from the area. At that time there was a daily schedule (weekday only) to depart for North Korea. This, however, was abruptly terminated on December 1, 2008 when the North Korean government closed the border crossing after accusing South Korea of a confrontational policy. 


Bird's eye-view of the Mangbaedan (altar) and beyond it Freedom Bridge





After 36 years of Japanese colonial rule, the Koreas were finally liberated on August 15, 1945, thanks to the sacrifices of service personnel who fought for the nation's independence and who helped bring about an end of World War II. However, before celebration could break out, Korea was arbitrarily divided into north and south according to a unilateral decision on the part of larger powers, regardless of the desire for the Koreans, who had been unified for thousands of years, to remain so. By splitting the country -- an act resulting from the Cold War -- parents and children were separated, husbands and wives were split, life-long neighbors and childhood friends were sundered, and the division remains even after the end of the Cold War. 

In the initial months after the division five million people were able to flee from the northern areas to the southern before the demarcation was regimented and tightly patrolled. They fled their homes where they had lived for generations in order to avoid the Soviet army and the North Korean Communist Party's persecution and brutalities. Refugees and sundered families and friends henceforward gathered at Imjingak, overlooking the lands of North Korea, and made a makeshift altar for offering special prayers and wishes on every Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving day) to honor their ancestors and those they had left behind in North Korea, and of course to pray for reunification. As years passed and reunification was not actualized, the temporary altar was eventually replaced by this Mangbaedan Memorial Altar, which is surrounded by seven granite stone-folding screens carved with the historical characteristics as well as topographical features of mountains and streams of the five provinces of North Korea along with the unclaimed territories of Gyeonggi and Gangwon. These scenes are to remind the refugees of their home, and as the description says, "ease their homesickness".


A few meters to the right of the altar is a monument dedicated to a song "30 Years Lost" which continually plays. The lyrics by Gunho Park and music by Gookin Nam, sung by Woondo Seol were used as the theme song of the show "Search for the Dispersed Families", which was aired on KBS from June 30th to November 14th, 1983. This song was such a sensational hit that it became listed in the Guinness Book of Records. The show "Search for Dispersed Families" was aired live for approximately 3312 hours and 45 minutes over the rather short period of 138 days, and it made contributions in reuniting 10,189 dispersed families. "30 Years Lost", as the theme song for the show, ended up being a huge hit in South Korea and is also well known in North Korea. This monument, dedicated both to the song and the dispersed families, is a symbol for reuniting what was once a cohesive unified nation.

The fence in this area is webbed with both barb-wire and razor-wire. There would be no getting over the fence easily or quickly. Tied to the fence are colored streamers, many of which are yellow for mourning or sadness but other colors exist. The streamers blowing in the air represent prayers blowing in the wind -- prayers for reunification and prayers for the good health of those in North Korea.


While a long part of the eastern fence-line is covered with blowing prayer-ribbons, the north fence is bare except for strategically placed stones in and along the fence.


There are four types of cold stones employed in this wall. 
  1. Auxiliary stone - installed to drop if someone cut or applied much pressure to the wire
  2. Hearing stone - installed at the base of the wire fence for falling stones to strike against so as to easily be heard by patrols
  3. Patrol tag - one tag is placed at the top and two tags are placed at the bottom of the fence for the purpose of marking what area has been last checked. One side of a stone is white and the other is red. As patrols pass these tags, they spin the colors so when a mixture of white and red tags are viewed at the same time, the area has not been checked yet.
  4. Trace stone - flat stones painted with "l" but unclear as to their purpose.




A steam locomotive (Registered Cultural Heritage in 2004) runs parallel the beribboned fence. It remains as a symbol of the tragic history of the division of the Korean peninsula, after being derailed by the bombs during the Korean War minutes after leaving what is now the DMZ. According to the train operator at that time, the train was destroyed at Jangdan Station while making a retreat from the advancing Chinese Communist Forces on the way to Pyeongyang; it was making efforts to deliver war materials, when it was derailed. The bent wheels and 1,020 bullet holes prevented the train from being further used in the war effort, but it now stands as a testimony to the atrocities of war and as a symbol to avoid further strife by nations needing to come to an understanding and reunifying.

Freedom Bridge (Gyeonggi-do Provincial Monument No. 162)


Standing behind Mangbaedan Memorial Altar at Imjingak Square is Freedom Bridge, which takes its name from the return of 12,773 prisoners of war in 1953 in the first exchange of prisoners after the signing of the armistice agreement that ended the Korean War. Two side-by-side railroad bridges on the Gyeongui Line originally spanned the Imjingang River. Both bridges were destroyed by bombing, leaving only the pier remains. To enable the exchange of prisoners of war, using the original piers the west bridge was rebuilt as a temporary structure so that repatriates could cross on foot what is now called Freedom Bridge. Freedom Bridge is 83 meters long 4.5 meters wide, and 8 meters high. It is a wooden structure reinforced by steel and represents a "return to freedom".

Freedom Bridge is blocked off. It is no secret that walking Freedom Bridge to the north would be to give up one's freedom for such an act would equate to "no return".
The prayers streaming on Freedom Bridge are densely packed.
The prayers for reunification so far have gone unanswered.

Saturday, November 8, 2014

Fusion Food: Vegan Style

My cousin as guest speaker at the Sahmyook Seventh-day Adventist main church near Heogi subway station was of course thanked for his spiritual contribution via a vegetarian banquet. As there are two types of Adventists, those who are meat eaters but follow the dietary laws of Leviticus 11 like the Jews and those who prefer to prefer the vegetarian fare, most churches serve vegetarian dishes to visiting speakers or for pot-lucks. But the food served for the guest speaker this time was phenomenal : totally vegan with no animal product of any kind and virtual rainbow display of food goodness.

The food had some fusion food flair but was still definitely recognizable as Korean cuisine. The kimchi was the only non-fusion food served. The other foods were a sweet potato noodle with veggies (잡채) without any meat or seafood, a yellow pepper light stir-fry, a vegetarian-style soy-based "meat" made bulgogi-style, spinach with unfermented tofu rubbed with sesame-seed oil, Vietnamese rice-paper wraps stuffed with raw veggies, and vegetarian "meat" stuffed tofu. A rather unusual but very complementary pumpkin soup was also served as most Korean meals have some kind of soup served with them. And of course since kimchi is so important and there are 200 or more kinds, serving another kimchi would not be out of line and so a fusion kimchi -- so elegantly prepared -- was served. It was very lightly fermented and the water was wonderfully flavored with turmeric, a southeast Asian and middle-Eastern spice that is now appearing on supermarket shelves in Korea. The kimchi was so divinely exquisite that it should be in gourmet cookbooks!


Of course when there are guests dessert is likely to appear and on the table was the traditional "dessert" or after-food. Korean traditional desserts aren't for cluttering up the meal and sitting heavy on the stomach but are usually for clearing the palate and the fruit -- persimmon, Asian pear, and apple slices -- was for just that.


A perfectly eye-candy and mouth-watering meal! In Korea it is good to have connections, and my cousin was the connection to feasting on one of the most spectacular vegetarian banquets I have ever eaten!

Saturday, November 1, 2014

Seokguram, and the Creation of Orientalism

Seokguram ("Stone-cave Hermitage") is a grotto hermitage and part of the Bulguksa temple complex. In 1962 during the Park Chung-hee era, it was designated National Treasure No. 24, and in 1995, Seokguram Grotto along with Bulguksa Temple was added as a UNESCO World Heritage for exemplifying some of the world's best Buddhist sculptures.

At the cultural peak of the Unified Silla Dynasty (668-935 BCE), Seokguram was built on Tohamsan, a sacred mountain during the United Silla era. Kim Daeseong, a court sculptor who resigned from his position, started work on Seokguram (originally called Seokbulsa, Stone Buddha Temple), but the work was completed a few years posthumous to Kim in 774. Kim not only built Seokguram Grotto but also Bulguksa, the temple four kilometers away. The latter he dedicated to his parents, and the former he dedicated to his parents in his former life, according to folk legend.

The Goryeo Dynasty (918-1392) was a time of Buddhist proliferation. However, when the dynasty was overthrown and the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1897) began, Buddhist practices fell into decline with the growing acceptance and pendulum swing for the philosophy of Confucianism rather than the following of the religious practices of Buddhism. Confucianism was for aesthetics and Buddhism which relied on visual iconography was downplayed, and by the fourth king of the Joseon Dynasty, Buddhism had little involvement in the courts. Buddhism was thus suppressed, and therefore its temples and grottos and places of worship were not valued and so given little regard or attention.

Repairs and renovations:


1703 & 1758 - During the Joseon Dynasty Seokguram underwent repairs and improvements but as Buddhism was suppressed during the era, by the end of the 505-year long dynasty temples and grottos not kept up had fallen into sad disrepair.

1909 - Seokguram was "discovered" by a Japanese mailman and reported to officials as a Buddha of astonishing beauty.

1913-15 - The Japanese completely dismantled Seokguram, but in putting it back together, the granite stones that had fit like "woven silk" and allowed circulation of air and indirect sources of light into the rotunda were not replicated in the reconstruction. Water and air circulation thus became a problem.

1917 - The Japanese buried drain pipes above the dome to channel rainwater away from the grotto, yet leaks continued.

1920-23 - The Japanese applied asphalt over the surface of the concrete, which increased entrapment of humidity, so moss and mold grew.

1927 - The Japanese attempted to clean off the moss and mold by steam spraying the sculptures, only resulting in disastrous results.

1960s - Park Chung-hee ordered a major restoration project. By building a wooden structure over the antechamber, a mechanical system was installed to regulate temperature and humidity. This structure is now under scholarly debate as historians disagree that the gaze of the Buddha was not interrupted in its perpetual contemplation of the East Sea.

The interior of the grotto is now further blocked by a glass window, which keeps a regulated temperature within the grotto. Visitors are permitted to go beyond this glass windows one day a year -- Buddha's birthday, and on this day there is free entry. On other days a person is required to pay W4,000.

Colonializing Korea's Past


In April 1909, the vice governor of the Japanese colonial government in Korea, Sone Araske, and his delegates had a photo taken sitting on the knee of a Buddha statue at the Seokguram Grotto in Gyeongju, South Gyeongsang Province. This is the oldest known photo of Seokguram, which was designated World Cultural Heritage in 1995. (not the above picture) - Source
The questions which should arise when reading about the repairs and renovations of Seokguram are why would the Japanese try to repair and as a result showcase historical brilliancy of a nation that it had annexed and made into a colony? Why would the Japanese colonial state spend money and resources to restore Seokguram (as well as Bulguksa and the Silla capital Kyoungju) and sing odes on Seokguram's beauty? 

One must ask these questions in order to understand the complexity of colonial domination and power. Ultimately colonial rule depended on coercive power -- the power to eradicate or repress armed resistance, the power to hold the upper-hand. But in order for the Japanese to sustain coercive power, they had to establish sufficient hegemony, and to do that, they had to create a political and cultural environment in which the colonized recognized the relative superiority of the colonizer.  

Well, the Japanese did quite like the British did to India and the American in the Philippines. They studied the language of those they colonized, did intense studies on culture, history, architecture and then wrote about their colonies in a way that would make them as righteous overseers of their colony. And the "discovery" of Seokguram in 1909 by a Japanese mailman climbing Tohamsan Mountain, the year before Japan annexed Korea, was the perfect cultural item to initiate on a pedagogy for asserting their cultural and historical superiority. The colonized Koreans had allowed this jewel of an ancient past to fall into near ruins, so what could they as the colonizer do but recreate the past and "teach" on its value back to the colonized. Thus Japanese researched and wrote on their colony, albeit in a somewhat proprietary way, teaching the world and Korea's place in it as defined by Japan. 

The "discovery" of the Buddha of astonishing beauty in Seokguram was the beginning of the colonial pedagogy. Japan did not initially intend to repair the grotto, but to take it apart stone by stone, which they did -- all except for the large Buddha with his ethereal smile. They planned to dismantle it, truck it down to Bulguksa and send it by rail to Kampo and then by boat to Japan. For this purpose, they had had a road constructed from Bulguksa to Seokguram and had drafted plans for a rail line from Bulguksa to Kampo on the East Sea. Costs, however, would have been prohibitive, not to mention the unlikelihood of "easy" transport to Japan as in North Kyeongsang Province the Righteous Army, which had sprung up with the forced abdication of King Kojong in 1907, was launching attacks against the Japanese, on their road and rail constructions and trying to inhibit other colonizing acts. Therefore, due to frightful costs and the concerns of being attacked, the plan for reconstructing Seokguram in Japan was aborted. 

In 1910, the year that Korea was annexed by Japan, Sekino Tadashi published a study explaining to the Japanese the artistic value of Seokguram. The first photos of Seokguram were published that year ... in Japan. In 1912 Governor-General Terauchi Masatake, the head of the colonial government, visited Seokguram and approved plans and a budget for restoration. The restoration began in 1913 and took three years to complete. 
"This shift in policy -- from plunder to restoration -- would showcase not just Seokguram but also Japan's sophistication and modernity, its mastery of the disciplines of archeology, architecture, and art history. This restoration work would demonstrate Japanese knowledge and commitment in studying, restoring and appreciating "Asian art". Japan would be the curator, uniquely able to preserve and present Asian art as equally compelling as Western art to both Asia and the West."
Thus school trips were organized with teachers bringing their students by rail from Seoul to Busan, and via roads built by the Japanese, and via the new road from Bulguksa to Seokguram, so under Japanese tutelage Koreans would learn about the beauty and significance of Seokguram. Similarly the beauty and grace of the ancient Buddha was brought to the attention of the West.

With the restoration and showcasing of Seokguram and Bulguksa as well as the discovery of the Guze Kannon (a mysteriously concealed seventh-century gilt-wood sculpture of a Buddha and obvious of Korean art "discovered" in the Japanese Horyuji Temple) Japan began discoursing on the artistic achievements in ancient times rather than in the pre-colonial past. Japan placed focus on a brilliant past that was Asian rather than Korean. Thus were the beginnings of Japanese toyoshi (Oriental history). Japan had set itself to lead Korea into a modern civilization, and the West could acknowledge that Japan's research and pedagogy did present to the world a knowledge previously unknown. Japan received adulation for its showcasing of knowledge. The West did not argue the colonization; the colonized Koreans were powerless to argue.
"Starting with the restoration of Seokguram, it was the Japanese colonial state that went on to establish controls over print capitalism as well as national systems of schooling, transportation, and communication that produced colonial Chosenjin (Koreans)... At the same time, there was a steady proliferation of discourses concerning Korean identity emanating from the Japanese colonial sate itself, including studies of Korean history, geography, language, customs, religion, music, and art in almost immeasurable detail."
What are we to make of this? The goal of exploiting Korea and using it for Japan's strategic ends was for marking Japan's position and destiny in relation to the West and the rest of Asia. The embodiment of toyoshi also provided justification for Japan's imperial expansion.

(Information given under "Colonializing Korea's Past" was taken from Chapter 3 in Henry Em's scholarly book "The Great Enterprise" (2013).

Overgrown, nearing collapse
source: Sungkyunkwan University Museum
Seokguram nearing collapse and in desperate need of repair - Source
renovations in process
source - Sungkyunkwan University Museum
The Japanese repairing Seokguram, many such photos taken by Japanese archaeologist Fujita Ryosaku of the repair and renovations of Seokguram are in the Sungkyunkwan University Museum, Millennium Building. Fujita Ryosaku also was the first archaeologist to identify two distinct types of ancient pottery in Korea, the "comb-pattern" pottery and the plain pattern pottery.  - Source