33 Keys to Decoding the Korean Wave, Hallyu #8 Bojagi, Bottari, Bossam 

We'll wrap you with good luck  

 

*한류를 이해하는 33가지 코드 #8 보자기, 보따리, 보쌈 <한국어 버전, Korean version>

http://www.nyculturebeat.com/index.php?mid=Focus&document_srl=4076177

 

Unidentified Artist Korean, Patchwork wrapping cloth (jogakbo), ca. 1950–80, Silk, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (from left)/ Wrapping cloth (Bojagi), 1950-1960, Silk, Collection of Asian Art Museum, San Francisco/ Unknown (Korean), Patchwork Bojagi (Wrapping Cloth), 20th century, silk, cloth, Detroit Institute of Arts

 

Today, Koreans carry various types of bags, such as tote bags, shoulder bags, cross-body bags, backpacks, briefcases, and immigration bags. Long before Western-style bags were adopted, our ancestors wrapped, covered, or packed and transported things with a square cloth, Bojagi. When a square-plane cloth, Bojagi, is tied in a knot while wrapping an object, it is transformed into a three-dimensional bundle, Bottari. During the Korean War, refugees fled with Bottari, the packages of luggage. Now artworks using Bojagi and Bottari as motifs are attracting worldwide attention. 

 

Korean Bojagi, which was once a craftwork of a Gyubang (boudoir), has been recognized for its artistry as a textile painting and has entered the collections of museums, one after another.  Korean traditional patchwork, Jogakbo, and modern reinterpretation of Bojagi are being introduced at the prestigious institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Detroit Institute of Art, Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, and Victoria & Albert Museum in London, to name a few.

 

“Our unique cultural heritage includes Mondrian and Paul Klee. The modern sense of form is far ahead of Europe. At the same time, the expression is as calm as ever. It’s as fresh as our clear autumn sky. It is because a person is released from one’s closed self-consciousness. It speaks of the ease of anonymity. It’s the Korean people’s artistic sense and life emotion. There are geometric compositions and lines, and there are collage techniques. There’s a combination of things at the farthest distance, surrealism. However, it is also the most functional and practical. Yes, it is also becoming the most elegant minimal art.”

- Kim Chunsu (1922-2004), “Praise for the Bojagi”  -

 

 

Ian Robertson, A stream of Korean refugees trudges along a dusty road away from the war. The refugees, mainly women and children, are carrying their possessions on their backs or in bundles on their heads. Korea, c. 1950-10. Australian War Memorial Collection

 

When did Koreans start using cloth? There is a record of the red cloth called “Hongpok (紅幅)” in the folktale of Yukgaya Sijo of “Samguk Yusa” (Overlooked Historical Records of the Three Korean Kingdoms, 1281). The Subo (embroidered cloth) in the late Goryeo Dynasty, which is owned by the Jeonju City Museum, is known as the oldest bojagi. During the Joseon Dynasty, the Chinese characters for bojagi were used together with “bok(袱, wrapping cloth)” and “bok(福, luck).” As a result, the cloth is a tool that conveys the heart as if wrapping blessings, and it is used from packaging to storage and transportation. Bojagi was used daily for wrapping clothes, blankets and books, or for table cover, and for special occasions such as  wedding rituals and Buddhist rituals, etc.

 

“Humanities of Bojagi” (by Lee O-young, 2015) / “Our bojagi that embraces the world” (by Heo Dong-hwa, 2013)/ "Book Bojagi" (author Lee Chun-hee , illustrated by Kim Dong-seong, 2013)/ Sara Cook, “Bojagi” (by Sara Cook, 2019)

 

Subo (embroidered bojagi) and Jogakbo (made with scraps of fabric) have artistic values. The Subo was embroidered with auspicious signs or blessings, symbolic patterns such as trees, flowers, birds, butterflies, mandarin ducks, cranes, phoenixes, and peacocks. On the other hand, Jogakbo did not come from the royal court, and was enjoyed by the common people. Jogakbo, which expresses the creative passion and aesthetic sense of women of the Joseon Dynasty, is the essence of Gyubang culture. Jogakbo is consistent with modern recycling art and it is regarded as a work of art that combines geometric composition and aesthetics, and also practicality and decorativeness.

 

As pointed out by the great poet Kim Chunsu, Jogakbo, which was our daily necessities, is now an art work comparable to the paintings of the painters Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee, and Joseph Albers. In addition to the collections of fashion designers, designs inspired by Jogakbo are emerging one after another in the fields of furniture, crafts, architecture, and performing arts. 

 

 

Chunghie Lee, Bojagi Artist

 

*Chunghie Lee: “Pojagi and Beyond” at the 2009 Festival of Quilts, England <YouTube>

 

 

In April 2001, textile artist Chunghie Lee showcased her creations at "Fashion in Motion," a program hosted by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Drawing inspiration from Bojagi, Ms. Lee presented a fashion collection that integrates silkscreens, calligraphy, and embroidery. The Victoria and Albert Museum, established in 1852 and named after Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, is the world's largest museum dedicated to applied arts and design. The museum featured a special exhibition titled "Hallyu! The Korean Wave," which began in September 2022 and traveled to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in March 2024, and the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco in September 2024.

Ms. Lee received her  BFA (furniture design) and MFA (textile art) degrees from Hongik University in Seoul. In 1994, she came to the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence as a Fulbright scholar, and since 1999, she has been teaching Korean textile arts at RISD.

 

At the 2010 European Patchwork Meeting in Alsace, France, she organized a number of exhibitions including “Pojagi & Beyond 2010,” “Korean/American Joomchi,” “Beyond the Quilting,” and “Korean Traditional Clothing.” In 2011, she was guest curator for “Wrapping Traditions: Korean Textiles Now,” a special exhibition at the Museum of Craft and Design, San Francisco, which introduced 65 works by Korean and foreign artists who reinterpreted traditional Korean textiles .

 

 

New Yorkers appreciating Jogakbo after attending a special lecture of “Wrapping for Luck: Korean Bojagi” by Chunghie Lee at the Bard Graduate Center in Manhattan in October 2006. Photo: Sukie Park/ The Korea Daily of New York  

 

In 2013, the Korea Society in New York City hosted a solo exhibition for Ms. Lee titled "BOJAGI: Texture, Color, and Beyond." This exhibition featured her innovative sculptures inspired by Bojagi, with a central theme of "No-Name Woman." This theme honored Korean women from the past who, despite living under patriarchal oppression, contributed significantly through their work, creating Bojagi from leftover cloth as they wove fabrics and cared for their families.

 

Ms. Lee authored “Bojagi & Beyond” and founded the Korea Bojagi Forum in 2012 to promote the beauty of sculpture to the world. And she has held the forums every other year in Korea.  Lee curated more than 10 “Bojagi & Beyond” “Hands of Korea” exhibitions in many parts of the world.  Meanwhile a British textile artist Sara Cook, who was fascinated by Ms. Lee’s work “No Name Woman” at the 2009 Festival of Quilts in Birmingham, England, published “Bojagi: Design And Techniques In Korean Textile Art.”

 

 

Kimsooja, Bottari Artist 

 

Kimsooja at Times Square for her performance “A Beggar Woman” in 2005  Photo: Sukie Park/ The Korea Daily of New York / Kimsooja, Bottari Truck- Migrateurs, 2007-2009, Single Channel Video Projection, silent, 10:00, loop, performed in Paris, Commissioned by Musée D’Art Contemporain du Val-De-Marne. Photo: Thierry Depagne 

 

Conceptual artist Kimsooja has worked with needles, threads, and Bottari as main motifs. Born in Daegu, she moved to New York after studying Western painting at Hongik University and the same Graduate School. In 1992 she was a resident artist at the PS1 Contemporary Art Center (now PS1 MoMA) in New York. 

 

At the 1st Gwangju Biennale in 1995, Kimsooja presented her video performance piece “Sewing into Walking - Dedicated to the Victims of Gwangju,” where she spread old clothes across a pine forest hill. This performance symbolized the victims of the Gwangju Uprising (5·18), using stitching as a metaphor for a requiem, stitching together the souls of the departed. Just as a two-dimensional Bojagi can be transformed into a three-dimensional Bottari when tied, Kimsooja's work reflected on the transformation of material and memory.

 

In 1998 MoMA PS1's group exhibition “Cities on the Move 3,” Kimsooja piled up Bottaris on a truck and moved 2727 km along the city and village where she lived in 11 days. It is a video work about immigration, identity, and journey as an artist from Korea to New York. Since then, she has been nicknamed as “Bottari Artist.”

 

In 1999, at the 48th Venice Biennale, Kimsooja exhibited “d’APERTutto, or Bottari Truck in Exile,” dedicated to the victims of the Kosovo War. Then, in “Kimsooja: A Needle Woman” (1999-2001), a multi-channel video, the artist posed an immobile posture like a needle on the streets of large cities in Tokyo, New York, London, Mexico City, Cairo, Delhi, Shanghai and Lagos. 

 

 

Kimsooja, A Needle Woman, 1999 - 2001, eight channel video projection, 6:33 loop, silent, Photo: Kimsooja Studio

 

Korea’s traditional gyubang (閨房) culture, represented by needlework, has been sublimated into art by global artist Kimsooja. The needle is a tool that connects and sews fabric, and it seems to metaphorize the alienation of modern people and their longing for communication and healing. On the other hand, a Bottari that reminds us of refugees and immigrants is an object containing traces of life and a story, and it is also the identity of the owner. For today’s people who have to constantly move like nomads, the Bottari seems like a symbol of the diaspora. Nomads leave a place while packing their Bottaris, and as they unpack them, they adapt to a new place. And the Bottari remains flat Bojagi.

 

Kimsooja was selected as an artist for the Korean Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale in 2013 and exhibited “Kimsooja, To Breathe: Bottari.” “Bottari Truck” was selected to represent 2000 in art historian Agnes Berecz’s book “100 Years, 100 Artworks: A History of Modern and Contemporary Art” in 2019.  http://www.kimsooja.com

 

 

New York “Bossam” Chef David Chang, Momofuku Ssäm Bar

 

From the “Ssambap” episode of the KBS-TV documentary “Korean Food Table” series hosted by TV actor Choi Bul-am (left)/ King Gojong Ssambap (right)

 

Bossam is a food eaten in one bite by wrapping boiled pork, kimchi stuffing, raw oysters, garlic, red pepper, vegetables and ssamjang in leafy vegetables such as lettuce, cabbage, sesame leaf, and pumpkin leaf. There was a custom of slaughtering pigs at feasts as pigs mean good fortune. Bossam (褓-) is a word that comes from the word “good luck/ Bo,” just like a Bojagi.

 

Recently, in Korea, Ssambap has become popular as a well-being food, and the number of Ssambap specialized  restaurants has increased in Korea. When did Korean ancestors start eating Ssambap? Ssambap dates back to Goguryeo (37 BC-668 AD). There is a record in the Chinese literature Cheonroksikyeo (天祿識餘) that the lettuce brought by an envoy from Goguryeo was of good quality, so it was called Cheongeumchae (千金菜), saying that the seeds could only be obtained by giving a thousand gold.

 

It is recorded that Goryeo women, who were taken to the Yuan Dynasty as maids, planted lettuce in the court’s yard to wrap rice so as to soothe their grief. Ssam has developed into a royal cuisine Gujeolpan (九折坂), a high-quality Ssam dish made with 8 ingredients such as beef, chicken, mushroom, cucumber, carrot, bean sprouts, radish, and shredded egg crepe and wrapped in wheat bread. Gujeolpan represents the yin-yang five elements of philosophy and food compatibility.

 

Bossam means “wrap good luck and eat.” In the late Joseon Dynasty, Ssam was a symbol of ups and downs. In Dongguk Sesigi (東國歲時記), Bokssam/Bossam is described as being eaten by wrapping rice in green leaves on Daeboreum Day, the first full moon of the Lunar New Year. People were supposed to open their mouths wide and eat Ssam, hoping for good fortune to come in. It is said that Ryu Seong-ryong, who wrote “Jeongbi-rok” as a wartime treasurer during the Imjin War (1592-1598, Japanese Invasion of Korea), played Baduk (Go) with one hand and wrapped the Ssam with the other. Also, when King Gojong (1852-1919) evacuated to Namyangju, it is said that he enjoyed Ssam with medicinal gochujang and maekjeok (grilled pork marinated in soybean paste). At most Ssambap restaurants, “Gojong Ssambap” is also on the menu.

 

Bossam, a combination of fresh vegetables, tender pork, oysters, a delicacy of the sea, fermented kimchi with salted fish-jeotgal and Ssamjang, is a complete food. Fresh vegetables from the field, slow food fermented for a long time, raw and cooked food, and ingredients from the sea and land are in the palm of your hand. Bossam is food that is completed by the eater at the table, not cooked in the kitchen. Also, Bossam is supposed to be shared with several people. 

 

 

Momofuku Ssäm Bar’s signature menu, Bo Ssäm (left) Photo: William Hereford/ David Chang Photo: Gabriele Stabile

 

The chef David Chang (Korean name Seok-ho Chang) of Momofuku made Bossam popular in New York City. Chang became a darling among the media and gourmets since he opened Momofuku Noodle Bar in the East Village in 2004. Noodle Bar’s popular dishes were Japanese ramen and a Chinese style roasted pork belly sandwich (Pork Bun). His second restaurant, Momofuku  Ssäm Bar, opened in the summer of 2006, served Mexican wrap sandwiches such as burrito and rice cakes, and received two stars from the New York Times. Afterwards, Chang made a bold move to remove the burritos from the menu and added whole roasted pork butt / Bo Ssäm. The New York Times gave Ssäm Bar three stars in late 2008. David Chang won the James Beard Foundation Award for Best Chef (New York City) that year. 

 

In New York, where there are more than 8 million New Yorkers and over 1 million Jews (and 2 million in New York State as a whole), David Chang earned the nickname “King of Pork” for bringing pork, their taboo food, to the fore. Furthermore, he taught individualistic New Yorkers how to eat Bossam in groups. Spread lettuce in your hand, wrap it with rice, pork, oysters, kimchi, and Ssamjang, and eat it in one bite. 

 

Bossam ($250, as of 2021), which can be shared by 6-10 people at Momofuku  Ssäm Bar, is a pork neck that is cured overnight and then baked for 6-8 hours, coated with brown sugar and roasting juice, Ssamjang, and Chinese ginger/scallion sauce. Recently, whole roasted fish Ssäm has also been on the menu. As the popularity of Bossam soared, the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Martha Stewart introduced a recipe for David Chang’s Bossam that took at least seven hours. 

 

After the COVID-19 pandemic, Momofuku  Ssäm Bar left the East Village and moved to South Street Seaport near Wall Street and upgraded to an upscale restaurant. As of September 2022, the BO SSÄM SET MENU can only be pre-ordered for groups of 8 or more, and is $90 per person. For the Bossam set menu, the heritage pork shoulder is marinated overnight and slowly baked for 6-8 hours, then glazed with brown sugar and roasting juice. Served with oysters, kimchi, ginger green onion chimichurri sauce, Korean ssamjang, fresh herbs, rice, and lettuce. Appetizers, side dishes, and desserts are served as well. https://ssambar.momofuku.com

 

 

Bojagi, Bottari, and Bossam: Koreans wishing for “good luck”

 

“Bojagi, Wrapping Everyday Life,” 2021, Seoul Museum of Craft Art  https://craftmuseum.seoul.go.kr

 

In his book “The Humanities of Bojagi” (2015), the late professor Lee O-young compared the “putting in culture” and “wrapping culture” with “whether to put it in a bag or to wrap it in a Bojagi.”  He wrote: “We are living in the shape of a Bojagi. The landscape of the information age of ‘one source, multi-use’ is also within the Bojagi. Although there is only one cloth, its use is flexible and omnidirectional.

 

We can wrap round items or square items, long or short, anything goes. Not only wrapping, but also tying, covering, laying, wearing, hiding, and even putting on a hat. And after using it, it goes back to the empty flat fabric. This is the magic of the Bojagi. Isn’t the elasticity of the Bojagi a supporter that overcomes the flaws in flexibility that modern science and technology have erased?”

 

Bojagi with elasticity and versatility, a mobile Bottari that can be carried around, healthy Bossam symbolizes our lives. Bojagi becomes clothing or an artwork from daily necessities, Bottari also becomes a work of art by a female artist expressing the agony of refugees looking for a settlement, and Bossam has evolved from a Korean dining table to a New Yorkers’ table for world gourmets.

 

In this way, Koreans have always prayed for good luck in clothing, shelter, and eating, and we put our hearts into everyday life such as Bojagi, Bottari and Bossam. Korean food, clothing and housing have significant meanings. People around the world are now discovering a hidden philosophy along with the flavors and styles of Korea.

 

 

Sukie Park

A native Korean, Sukie Park studied journalism and film & theater in Seoul. She worked as a reporter with several Korean pop, cinema, photography and video magazines, as a writer at Korean radio (KBS-2FM 영화음악실) and television (MBC-TV 출발 비디오 여행) stations, and as a copywriter at a video company(대우 비디오). Since she moved to New York City, Sukie covered culture and travel for The Korea Daily of New York(뉴욕중앙일보) as a journalist. In 2012 she founded www.NYCultureBeat.com, a Korean language website about cultural events, food, wine, shopping, sightseeing, travel and people.

 

 

 

33 Keys to Decoding the Korean Wave, Hallyu 

Beyond BTS, Parasite & Squid Game 

 

CONTENTS

 

#Prologue: 국풍인가, 국뽕인가 Dynamic Korea, Sparkling Koreans