By Kwon Mee-yoo
The signboard of the restored Gwanghwamun is visibly marred with cracks only about three months after the restored gate was reopened to the public in August. The cracks raise the question as to whether the restoration of the landmark gate was done properly.
Rep. Choi Moon-soon of the main opposition Democratic Party took photos of the cracked signboard of Gwanghwamun, Wednesday.
There are three cracks on the signboard — the biggest one is vertical in front of the rightmost letter “gwang.” Two finer crevices are located below the letter “hwa” and upper left side of “mun.”
The lawmaker said this is evidence of the shoddy reconstruction of Gwanghwamun, which aimed to regain the original splendor of 145 years ago.
The Cultural Heritage Administration (CHA) said it is natural for this to happen to the wood used for the sign.
“The Korean land pine used for the signboard contracts in dry autumn weather and causes minor cracks. It is a common phenomenon,” a CHA official said. “We knew this characteristic of Korean pine in advance, but we thought it would be proper to make the representative signboard with wood from Korean trees.”
CHA said there are traditional repair methods to fill the cracks with sawdust and glue and paint it again.
Master letter-carver O Ok-jin, who made the signboard in question, said the board cracked because it was not dried properly. Hwang Pyung-woo, director of the Korea Cultural Heritage Research Institute, visited Gwanghwamun to check the cracks and said there are more than 10 small cracks on the board.
“It rained a lot this summer while the sign was being made. I suspect not taking enough time to let the wood dry caused the cracks,” he said.
CHA claims that other signboards made of Korean land pine also have minor crevices. Hwang refuted that he checked the photos of palace signboards and found that ancient ones do not have such cracks, but recent ones such as Deoksu Palace and Gyeonghui Palace are cracked.
“In my opinion, the government did not follow the traditional tablet-making method, but instead took a shortcut to just carve the letters and prepare the wooden signboard in time,” he said.
The restoration of the landmark gate started in 2007 and was scheduled to be finished in December 2010. However, the government advanced the completion date to coincide with Independence Day and before the upcoming G20 summit, leading to the controversy over fraudulent construction.