In a modern society, color is a critical factor which represents an artist’ inner world from the artistic perspective. Unlike the past, social and cultural circumstances including art have become more dynamic. In addition, there have been a lot of s...
In a modern society, color is a critical factor which represents an artist’ inner world from the artistic perspective. Unlike the past, social and cultural circumstances including art have become more dynamic. In addition, there have been a lot of studies on how to use diverse colors. Under these circumstances, more artists have come up with paintings with modern colors by accepting and inhering traditional colors with
more interest in Korean painting and color. Korean people have established shamanistic color views on nature and traditional color focusing on theory of eumyangohaeng (yin?yang & five elements)?based obangsaek (‘five directional colors’). In particular, obangsaek had a direct effect on Korean traditional painting. Among them, ancient tomb mural paintings of Goguryeo, Buddhist paintings of Goryeo and folk paintings of Joseon have revealed unique have revealed unique natural features and racial traits and developed the beauty and imagination of Korean traditional color. This study has analyzed ancient tomb mural paintings, Buddhist paintings and folk paintings which express the symbolic meaning of obangsaek very well among obangsaek?based Korean traditional paintings. In the early stage of ancient mural painting, a character’s portrait and lifestyle were painted in a dark color. With
the passage of time, however, diverse colors were used with a unique esthetic sense, covering the concepts of Taoism. In Buddhist painting, delicate composition and coloration and loud colors are observed. In folk paintings, deep colors were used, showing the formative world of ornamental functions.
In addition, the meaning of obangsaek in modern painting has been investigated through analysis on the works of leading Korean painters (ex: Park Saeng?gwang, Kim Gi?chang, Park Noh?soo, etc.) who have expressed obangsaek based on their own creativity using modern color awareness. Even though they painted paintings based on national emotion, the methodology and materials of their paintings are relatively modern. For example, Park Saeng?gwang used loud colors and revealed unique composition based on the aesthetic sense and color materials of traditional Korean painting. On the contrary, Kim Gi?chang expressed humor and commoners lifestyles using liberal lines and complementary contrast based on the materials from folk paintings. Park Noh?soo painted with the spirit of paintings in the literary artists style and
modern emotions and expressed oriental sentiment by simplifying colors through strong contrast effects between dark indigo blue and yellow. As stated above, obangsaek has developed a modern and unique world of
painting through reinterpretation and composition of color as a means of expressing an object. In addition, it has made people realize the value of ‘Korean traditional color’ in terms of recovery of color autonomy.
Furthermore, it is required to inherit and develop it into our previous value.