Introduction
Korean mask, as one of the most quintessential symbol of the intangible cultural properties of Korea, reflects traditional Korean cultural values through its depiction of conflicts between classes represented by various symbolic characters. This essay will specifically examine a Korean mask representing Nojang, an old depraved monk, and the mask’s shifted meanings caused by the problematic display at MOA (UBC Museum of Anthropology), as a “universal museum”. Nojang mask was made of ground fruit, cotton fibre, paper, adhesive and paints (Moacat 2669/5: Materials). The mask was originally produced in Vancouver by the traditional Korean artist Changhyun Han, and is currently displayed in case 077 at MOA (Moacat 2669/5: Overview).
Original Context
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Songpa mask dance originated in the central region of the Korean peninsula around nineteenth centuries. It was often played outdoors at public market to attract people. Masks were believed to dispel evil spirits, diseases and beasts; to manifest supernatural beings; to honor the deceased and to represent totemic animals (Durgadas). The majority of performers came from the primary level social groups such as servants, merchants and labors for middle classes etc. (Jeong 3). The mask dance in this region is mainly performed on festive days such as New Year’s Day, Dano (May 5 on the lunar calendar), Buddhist All Souls’ Day (July 15 on the lunar calendar), and Chuseok (Korea’s Thanksgiving Day). Unlike other mask performances around the world such as the Guatemalan Dance of the Conquest, which often has clear distinction between the audience and the performers, Korean mask dances are remarkable in their enthusiastic unity with the audience in which everyone joins together and brings the mask dance to the
The deeply rooted history of a Confucian paradigm in Korea has for long limited women’s roles and rights. In the male-dominated and patriarchal society, women’s roles remained in the domestic sphere, where they were required to be submissive. However, with the introduction of westernization and modernity in the 1920s, modern generation was rapidly incorporated into colonial modernity. Korean women began to “redefine the Korean female identity” by displaying the “new woman” characteristics, in which some literate women initiated to “enhance their education, determine their own physical appearance, and contribute to the debate about changing gender roles and expectations”(Yoo, p.59) Fearing the threat of the emergence of the “new women” with
Another thing that the cultural rule helped to benefit Hong Ulsu and Kang Pyongju was to provide them jobs that Koreans would never had before under Japan’s rule. The cultural rule not only helped in the expansion of schools which allowed Koreans more opportunities to gain advanced studies and more job options, but appointed more Koreans to civil services and judiciary, created advisory councils of carefully chosen Koreans, and nominally re-adjusted dual pay scale for bureaucrats. Again, Hong Ulsu met a kind Japanese person who became his boss when he work for him as an apprentice in which he was the one who helped him the most when he arrived in Japan, such as he provided meals for him, paid him his wages, and also paid for his schooling.
The mask is part of the ceremony known as "the Dance of the Goats” or La Danza de los Chivos. The mask on masksoftheworld.com is from Chilpancingo, State of Guerrero, Mexico. However, the traditional Dance of the Goats began in Zitlala, State of Guerrero, Mexico. The villagers created the dance after the Mexican Revolution in 1910. After the war, an epidemic took place that eliminated almost all livestock in the area. Even with the epidemic, the people were able to complete the construction of their primary church, but afterwards were left with nothing. They decided to approach the patron saint of the village, St. Nicholas to express their concerns and worries. Once they were before him, they dressed and danced as goats. Afterwards, the villagers believed that Saint Nicholas had performed a miracle. From then on, they perform the ceremony every year on the day of St. Nicholas on September 10th. The dance represents the tradition of rural life that portrays peasant life and the daily struggle to keep the heritage of peasant families alive. The idea is to capture daily life through art. The purpose of the mask used in this dance is to transform the dancers into the character of a goat.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has one of the finest Asian art collections that has enlightened and strengthened my understanding in my personal art experience. The Museum itself is an artistic architectural structure that graces the entire block on 82nd Street in Manhattan. Entering inside, I sensed myself going back into an era, into a past where people traded ideas and learned from each other. It is a past, where I still find their works of yesteryears vividly within my grasp, to be remembered and shared as if their reflections of works were cast for the modern devoted learner.
2) The mask represents values that the Chokwe people attach to the rite of passage and womanhood. Such values are introspection and wisdom. The mask conveys introspection and wisdom because the eyes and mouth are closed meaning the female is looking inward, thinking and reflecting. The woman that the mask represents is constructed this way because the women that it celebrates have already obtained wisdom and have no need to look outward for it.
Although concerns about cultural appropriating cultural objects such as bindis, war bonnets, and kimonos have been receiving more attention, the effects of cultural tourism of modern Asian subcultures has been relatively ignored. This lack of attention may be due to the assumption of modernity as Western or a lack of an object that bears significant cultural meaning to the ethnic culture as a whole. However, if the potential effects are left ignored, cultural tourism of modern Asian subcultures may perpetuate harmful constructions of race. The visual analysis of Gwen Stefani and Avril Lavinge’s cultural appropriation of Harajuku culture reveals that it not only reaffirms Asian American female submissiveness and Asian American invisibility, but it also constructs meanings of race and whiteness that excludes American cultural citizenship from Asian Americans.
Crooked Beak of Heaven Mask is a big bird-figure mask from late nineteenth century made by Kwakwaka’wakw tribe. Black is a broad color over the entire mask. Red and white are used partially around its eyes, mouth, nose, and beak. Its beak and mouth are made to be opened, and this leads us to the important fact in both formal analysis and historical or cultural understanding: Transformation theme. Keeping that in mind, I would like to state formal analysis that I concluded from the artwork itself without connecting to cultural background. Then I would go further analysis relating artistic features to social, historical, and cultural background and figure out what this art meant to those people.
This is almost a tribal ritual making a mask. The boys use masks to cover their identity and this allows them to kill.
Leading up to the celebration the girls are taught a certain dance that must be performed at the ceremony. “the new initiates are brought into town for the first time since the initiation process began…” At the ceremony the Mende girls wear a Sowei mask and costume which is considered to be the embodiment of the river spirt Sowo. Once the mask and costume is on the person transforms and her actions are no longer hers but are the actions of the spirt Sowo. A sacred dance is performed and dance moves represent the strength and power of woman as members in the Mende community. “Sowo mask are divided into three structural components- the neck, face, and coiffure. Carved from a single block of lightweight wood, the masks weigh only two to four pounds. The mask displays a shiny black surface representative of the value assigned to smooth dark skin.” The rings around the masks neck demonstrates a trait that is considered beautiful in Mende cultures. Every mask has a different hairstyle, representing the style of the woman the mask is made for, you can see items such as shells, metal and claws on the coiffure.
Poetry is a form of literature that some view as obsolete in the modern world, but in the poem “To the Man Who Shouted ‘I Like Pork Fried Rice’ at Me on the Street”, Franny Choi dispels that belief. She uses poetry as a medium to convey her own personal experience with the stereotyping and fetishization of Asian American women, which is an issue that millions of Asian American women still face today. When considering Choi’s background as a Korean American woman and how that has shaped her identity and philosophy, we see how being an Asian American woman is intrinsically a core part of her work, which is why much of her work is about breaking the stereotypes that come with this identity.
China Gaze. “The Secrets of Masks in Chinese Opera.” ChinaGaze.com. 10 Aug 2013. Web. 23 March 2014.
By any measure, The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong, known as Hanjungnok (Records written in silence), is a remarkable piece of Korean literature and an invaluable historical document, in which a Korean woman narrated an event that can be described as the ultimate male power rivalry surrounding a father-son conflict that culminates in her husband’s death. However, the Memoirs were much more than a political and historical murder mystery; writing this memoir was her way of seeking forgiveness. As Haboush pointed out in her informative Introduction, Lady Hyegyong experienced a conflict herself between the demands imposed by the roles that came with her marriage, each of which included both public and private aspects. We see that Lady Hyegyong justified her decision to live as choosing the most public of her duties, and she decided that for her and other members of her family must to be judged fairly, which required an accurate understanding of the her husband’s death. It was also important to understand that Lady Hyegyong had to endure the
The men of the tribe then join in the preparations for the dance by construct sweat lodges, which are used in the ceremony. They also collect other necessities, which are needed for the dance. The first day before the Sun Dance is a very significant day. In the early morning hours a group of men “known for their eminence in their tribe were chosen to look for a (cottonwood) tree with a fork in the top” (“Dance”). Along with this select group went a chosen woman.
We visited the Museo Nacional De Antropologa in Madrid, and were assigned to analyse the Asian Room, which is focused particularly on the Philippine Islands because of their historical colonisation with Spain. The display of things in a museum are things that we look at as something that is outside of normal. In contrast to the movie or movies, where scenes substantially show how the person felt and dealt with situations and tools from their own perspective, with their own knowledge and experience and through different means such as real images, sounds, language and others produces a different knowledge on the racial discourse. When looking at exhibitions in museums the other culture is unknown, and almost uncomfortable to us, but in movies we can be standing in their shoes.
Different dances came from different cultures in this performance. As I had said before, “Oshun, Goddess of Love”, came from Africa. It arrived in America during the slave trade and has been here ever since. “Paper Moon” came from Japan. The text from the dance came from an adaptation from “Omoiyari”, which is an ancient Japanese dance ritual.