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Introduction
- University of Hawai'i Press
- Chapter
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This book traces the transformation of architecture and urban space over the course of the last one hundred tumultuous years of Korea’s history, a time when the built environment changed so fundamentally that it is difficult to grasp completely its transfigurations. Judging from pictures taken by an Australian photographer in 1904, Korea at that time was a land of seclusion and isolation, remote from modern civilization. The urban population was barely 3 percent of the total; the population of Seoul, Korea’s bustling urban capital, was less than 200,000. The majority of the land was blanketed with rice paddies and farm fields, sparsely dotted with thatched roof houses. Within a mere one hundred years, Korea transformed itself into a completely modern society. Today’s population has increased fivefold, with more than 80 percent of it living in its urban centers. Much of the pastoral landscape has been converted into large, monolithic buildings and labyrinthine networks of streets. Obviously, the process was not easy. Buildings and cities were repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt due to a succession of vehement sociopolitical disturbances. Indeed, the changes were so dramatic that few buildings constructed one hundred or more years ago remain. The legacy of the twentieth century in Korea must be regarded as one equally made up of destruction and construction. Ruptures and Continuities Although modernization began more than a century later in Korea than it did in the West, it has been the predominant ideology throughout the past century, bringing about radical changes in Korea’s architecture and cities. The nature of modernity, which continuously negates what existed in the past, brought with it the complete uprooting of the traditional lifestyle. As a result, the history of Korean architecture and urbanism over the last century has been characterized by discontinuities, ruptures, and transformations. Two thick fault lines are particularly significant: the first sandwiched between liberation (1945) and the Korean War (1950–1953), and the second, between the late 1980s and early 1990s. Although the second fault line, marking a transition in the South from a military regime to a democratic society, was perhaps not as dramatic as the events surrounding the first, it was still the case that architectural and urban discourse changed remarkably in both. With these ruptures as boundaries, Korean architecture of the twentieth century falls into three distinct periods, with modernity taking on a different meaning in each. The first, coinciding with the period of Japanese occupation, was a time of colonial modernism. A particular strand of modern civilization, including some Western technologies, was transplanted to Korea via Japan, and a modern way of life started to take shape for the first time, albeit in a distorted way. The second period, extending from 1961 to 1988, was a time of developmental dictatorship when the Korean government presided over a largescale construction boom, and architects sought to establish a modern identity through traditional means. The last period, which began to take shape in the mid-1990s, may be defined as a time when Korea’s modernization was not only achieved, but also subsumed in the globalizing trend of the present era. Because the modernization of Korea was belated, it condensed into a very short time period changes that had taken place over more than two centuries in the West. But while the rapid and radical changes that have occurred are undeniable, of greater significance for this study is the identification of elements that have remained unchanged. In Korea, long-standing relationships between humans and their built environment have formed continuities that are still deeply rooted in the way of life of the Korean people. Introduction xii Introduction For this reason, regionalism exerted a powerful influence on Korean architects in the twentieth century, inspiring them to discover formal ideals in the method of organizing outdoor space which they found in old temples; the topological singularities in traditional gardens; the multilayered arrangement of walls in old palaces; and the different types of courtyards in traditional houses, all with a view to projecting them in a modern fashion. It is evident that the practices of Korean architects are deeply associated with the places where they grew up, and by exploring those places, Korean architects have pursued and found a modern identity that can be called their own. For that reason, identifying the elements of continuity and the process of their transformation through the last century is of great importance in this study. Practicing in a Structured Field Because it is impossible to consider...