'Jade accepts any challenge of man'

Jade carving artisan Jang Ju-won cuts a jade at his workshop in Mokpo, South Jeolla Province. / Courtesy of Jang Ju-won

Carving artisan Jang Ju-won succeeds, develops his craft

By Kim Ji-soo

MOKPO, South Jeolla Province — Nestled between a low-lying rock shaped like a Korean traditional hat and the southern sea, Jang Ju-won’s jade training and exhibition center may well boast one of the best facility locations.

The 77-year-old Jang is the nation’s only Important Intangible Cultural Asset in jade carving. The late President Kim Dae-jung came from South Jeolla Province and state money was invested to build stately edifices for a presidential hometown.

While Jang is content with his center, he notes how other artisans rarely receive national recognition and support. “The government supports the modern arts. Why not the traditional ones? The traditional arts masters barely make a living and thus move onto other jobs,” Jang said in a fiery tone during his speech as the president of the Korea Important Intangible Cultural Asset Craftsmanship & Arts Association.

Jang Ju-won’s “Incense burner of white jade with phoenix and lotus flower” features a modern S-line shape with the phoenix. It is on display at Jang’s training and exhibition in Mokpo, South Jeolla Province.

When asked about jade, he softens a bit, like a man talking about his first love. His change in temperament is akin to the nature of jade, which is nearly seven degrees in hardness but textured enough to yield various lines and shapes.

Jade art originated from China, but jade art in Korea go back to the Stone Age and the Three Kingdoms era in the forms of crooked jade, tubed jade and ball-shaped jade in tombs. It continued into the Goryeo era in the form of ornamental sculptures and into the Joseon era also in the form of ornaments. Jade art was very important during the Joseon era that a National Craft Office was even established at the time.

In spite of his inclination to easily become bored, Jang never became bored of jade.

Jang’s “Green jade mythical uniforn-lion-shaped incense burner”

“Jade, unlike the colored jewel stones, is subtly charming,” Jang said in an interview with The Korea Times. “Jade also embraces any challenges man makes,” he said.

Jang was born in 1937 in the town of Mokpo. His father was a gold and silver craftsman, but he went off to play the saxophone at the U.S. Army base in Seoul after graduating from high school. Although he eventually took up his father’s craft in Jongno, he soon needed a new challenge.

He turned to learning jade art with the traditional processes of quarrying, design, cutting, shaping, perforating, grooving and polishing. He didn’t mention any specific teachers, because he learned the art by himself. In one interview, he was quoted as saying he has spent the equivalent of 90 years in jade art because he worked 20 hours a day for 20 years on the craft. He still maintains about 40 percent of the steps used in the traditional method.

“Meeting of black jade between East & West” ( 33*49*12), created by Jang, is on display at Jang’s training and exhibition center in Mokpo.

He is known for his distinctive skills and achievements including developing the loop chain method, where from one jade stone he carves out a chain of loops.

And Jang is famous for his skill for penetrating the jade to create a donut hole for products such as the “yeonjeok” or small mouth-shaped tools for holding water for diluting the charcoal for calligraphy writing. He has also produced a jade Korean flute, which has caused Chinese art appreciators to drop their jaws in awe, he said.

“I think it took me 30 years to master the round, circular penetrating method, through which I wanted to portray the orbit of the sun and moon,” Jang said. “After about 27 years, I thought I would not finish developing the method in my lifetime, but during one meditation, it just came to me,” he said. This singular method has prompted love calls from Chinese and Japanese jade aficionados, whom he had to turn down to preserve the zeitgeist of Korean jade carving during his time.

This is an image of another of Jang’s loop chain work.

“People say my jade carving is not traditional, that it’s too modern,” he said. “But what is tradition it is merely preserved and not developed or taken a step forward?” he said.

He also emphasized that he is a maverick in the traditional artisan world, because he has always espoused on the need to develop traditional art. Jang said he remembers “debating” on the topic with Ye Yong-hae, a former journalist who created the word Intangible Cultural Asset to help Korea preserve traditional arts. Indeed, he was dressed snappily in a western suit during the interview, unlike other artisans who wear traditional Korean attire at work. He also creates works based on how he feels, like when he restored the Incense Burner of White Jade with Shape of Mt. Bonglae, which was discovered in the early 1990s in Buyeo, South Chuncheong Province. Since then, he has worked on the incense burner five more times “to create a modern feel with an S-line shape of the phoenix’s feathers,” he said, pointing to his version of the piece on display at his exhibition center.

Jang considers his work to have reached about 70 to 80 percent in the art of jade carving. Coincidentally, among the various colors of jade, from the startling white to the absolute black, his favorite is silver-gray, which would be about 70 to 80 percent of the black.

Designated in 1996 as the Important Intangible Cultural Asset No. 100, he has trained four successors. Now, however, only three are left, two of whom are his sons, because it is hard to make a living on traditional craft. The price of jade is expensive, and consequently, jade items are high-priced. He said there are now only about 15 jade artisans left in Korea. He also said he was able to support his wife and four children largely because his wife runs a small gold shop.

“Hmm ... Would you buy them? Some of them are expensive,” Jang said when asked whether his works sell, referring to his large works like the incense burner and the three-part series on knots in black jade. For the past two decades or so, he has been working on a piece titled “Korea Fantasy” on a 3-ton green jade, detailing the history of Korea from the mythical founder Dangun to contemporary Korea.

In the near future, he is looking to work with and train jade artisans in Myanmar, which accounts for about 70 percent of the world’s top-grade jade.

“People there could learn skills, and their jade works could be brought over here in Korea for the final finishing process,” Jang said.