By Chung Ah-young
Staff Reporter
WONJU - Lacquer-ware inlaid with mother-of-pearl, known as ``najeonchilgi,'' was one of the luxurious items symbolizing wealth and nobility both in the past and present.
``Najeon'' means mother-of-pearl and ``chilgi'' refers to lacquer-ware. ``Najeonchilgi'' was synonymous with wealth until the 1970s-80s but is becoming a thing of the past in this modern world as lifestyle choices have changed from ``hanok,'' in which traditional lacquered dressers and closets decorated with the mother-of-pearl inlay, gave way to Western-style fitted furnished apartments.
However, Lee Hyung-man, a master of ``najeonchilgi,'' keeps developing the complicated and delicate skills in his small workshop here in Wonju, Gangwon Province.
Behind this delicate craft, there are immeasurable hours of labor put in by traditional artisans.
The 62-year-old master, designated as Important Intangible Cultural Property No. 10 in 1993, moved to Wonju in 1970 from Tongyeong in South Gyeongsang Province, home of ``najeon,'' mostly because of its abundant production of sea shells. The seashells are the main material for the craft.
``Many lacquer ware craftsmen live in Tongyeong but my teacher settled here before he died to use the better quality `ot,' (natural lacquer) which was produced here,'' he said in an interview with The Korea Times.
The lacquer trees or called ``otnamu'' in Korean, are cultivated and tapped for their toxic sap, which is used as a highly durable lacquer to make Chinese, Korean and Japanese lacquerware.
A caustic, toxic sap is tapped from the trunk of the lacquer trees to produce lacquer. This is done by slashing the trunk of a 10-year-old tree horizontally 5-10 times, and then collecting the greyish yellow sap exuding from the wounds.
Lee said that Wonju is one of the producers of lacquer trees in Asia with high quality natural lacquer.
``It is important how to design the mother-of-pearl and the shells in the inlay process. But coating with the lacquer perfects the artifact,'' he said.
His teacher, Kim Bong-ryong, the first designated master in ``najeonchilgi,'' taught Lee at the craftsman training school in South Gyeongsang Province in the 1960s. The late Kim passed away in 1993.
He said that his teacher taught not only the skills but also the way of living and thinking to develop a good personality.
``My teacher led me to settle here too, when I came back from military service in 1970,'' he said.
But he said that recently it is becoming hard to obtain the quality lacquer available.
To cope with the lack of lacquer production, the region planted about 1.4 million lacquer trees up to last year. ``Currently, because of the lack of the lacquer, prices are getting very expensive,'' he said.
The traditional lacquer crafts are estimated to go back 1,500 years. But it is widely known to have peaked during the Goryeo Kingdom (918-1392).
Goryeo ware features sparkling colors, their surfaces densely adorned with tiny, regular flower shapes made of sea turtle shells and mother-of-pearl. The patterns of ``najeonchilgi'' began to change as the brilliant Buddhist culture during the Goryeo period gave way to the temperate Confucian culture during the Joseo period (1392-1910).
At that time, the flower shapes became bigger and more diverse, and differed from the Goryeo period in pattern and color.
The flower patterns were more sparsely inlaid on the surface of the wares, which makes them appear more real than those of the Goryeo wares.
To make a piece of ``najeonchilgi'' requires the three basic materials _ mother of pearl (or seashells), lacquer and wood. The process involves approximately 45 time-consuming stages, he said.
The first step is to make a basic frame by using various trees such as red pine, Oregon pine, Zelcova, Paulownia or other fine-quality wood.
Once the frame is finely polished, then it should be coated with ``saengot,'' or fresh lacquer evenly.
Then lacquer, or ``chiljuk,'' or lacquer paste, has to be applied on any corners or cracks.
The surface of the object is then covered with a hemp cloth, which is lacquered on.
Then the process of drying and coating is repeated before the inlaying of the mother-of-pearl designs begins. The last step is grinding, lacquering and polishing over and over again.
In Korea, the techniques of inlaying mother-of-pearl designs are categorized into the two types, ``jureumjil'' (filing) and ``ggeuneumjil'' (cutting), according to how the designs are produced and inlaid.
The first method Lee specializes in refers to the process of putting designs, such as birds and flowers, onto the finished mother of pearl blanks, and removing them using scissors and files.
The arrival of the bandsaw in the early 20th century made the work much easier and helped create finer designs.
The shells he uses are unusual mother-of-pearl and ear shells growing in the local seas.
``Shells growing in our country have various colors and are very shiny, compared to the shells produced in other countries. Particularly, the shells produced in the southern seas have beautiful colors. Foreign shells are very plain usually with just one color,'' he said.
To make a pattern, he said that he uses various shells by cutting the good quality parts and colors to give perspective to the pattern by using only the colors of the shells.
``I found that recently the sizes of the shells are getting smaller because of the sea pollution,'' he said.
Lee has taught students at Paichai University in Daejeon for about 10 years. He said that teaching young students has given him inspiration to make better designs and patterns.
``I don't think just sticking to the past is a way of preserving the tradition. Learning from modernity and combining it with tradition is a way to make progress in traditional skills,'' he said.
Among the complicated processes, Lee puts more emphasis on design because it reflects the artisans' creativity.
``Making `najeonchilgi' can be achieved if one tries hard to learn the skills. But making the best designs using those skills requires creativity and artistry,'' he said.
Lee said that he doesn't make the same pattern more than three times because he values highly the rarity of designs so that consumers want to own it.
But he said that simple and restrained designs are the best ones. ``In the past, I used a lot of the shells to shape up the patterns,'' he said.
``But now I realized that making one little point of a shell piece has beauty to decorate the remaining blanks. My teacher used to tell me; `Use one tiny piece of the shell like a jewel','' he said.
Lee said that not only adorning with the mother-of-pearl but also coating with ``ot'' or the natural lacquer enhances the traditional beauty of the piece.
He said that coating of the natural lacquer sterilizes the ware so that they can be used as various kitchen utensils such as spoons, cups, bowls and tables.
```Najeonchilgi' can be used as various items such as accessories and living items as decorations,'' he said.
``Go beyond the bondage of tradition, which can limit creativity, and diversify it to bring practical use so that many modern people grow to like it. That's the way of preserving tradition, I think,'' he said.