Tradition tackled: New takes on hanbok
First-time model Kelly helps revolutionize hanbok, in this case, from Heo Sarang Hanbok. All photos by Michael Hurt
By Michael Hurt
My latest project involves taking the traditional Korean hanbok and its traditional photographic treatment from new angles, by placing it quite literally in different light, and by placing it onto different bodies ― or at least bodies possessed of difference relative to the traditional Korean center.
One association of hanbok is, of course, with traditionally accepted lighter skin tones, as well as in “traditional” environments such as Joseon-era buildings and interiors. But designer Heo Hye-young’s hanboks also bring the traditional cuts and fabrics of hanbok into the realm of a universal (inevitably, Western) standard in which it can find easy, even accidental mixture and a new synthesis.
It is through Kelly’s body that the trendy jacket she wore to the shoot that day can organically fuse with the fashion beret, basic black heels and the edgier, somewhat more oppositional stance that Kelly’s mode of femininity assumes. This is greatly, yet subtly, different from the modes of demure femininity strongly associated with the traditional take on hanbok.
Kelly against a modern, urban backdrop in Haebangchon, Seoul.
And when old and new, modern and traditional, East and West, Korean and most extremely other, all find fusion through a single, self-aware body, wonderful new connections can be made. Placing a fusion Heo Sarang hanbok against an “urban”-looking wall full of paint marks and graffiti, which is enhanced by all the fusions mentioned, along with the accidental alignment of the single, flyaway strand of hair in the same direction as the ivy branches, all give this picture a sense of wind- and time-swept motion.
UFC Fight Night at Jangchung Arena.
One of the things we often see hanbok placed in static relief against is a socially neutral and safe, somewhat removed kind of space. We wanted to place a lively, fusion-style hanbok on a “multiculturalism”-era Korean female body in a space not often seen as a space where women by themselves would go. Hence, we chose to shoot against the bloody backdrop of Friday fight night and all the garish lights of Jangchung Stadium ― the perfect out-of-place place for a modern hanbok!
And finally, by way of anti-climactic denouement, the most fused space of all ― Bonny’s Pizza after our shoot in Haebangchon.
The eye-opening Lee Young Hee hanbok in a 2009 runway show at Seoul Fashion Week.
I’d like to end this short piece with one of the most eye-opening, successful fusion creations I’ve ever shot, a Lee Young Hee hanbok in a 2009 runway show at Seoul Fashion Week. Here she is mixing, through a single model’s body and dress, old and new elements, Korean and Western modes of the dress, as well as differing aristocratic/commoner notions of appropriateness in showing the breasts (a no-no for yangban, aristocratic-class women but a sign of matronly accomplishment for common women). If my memory serves me correctly, Lee was also playing with the inner- and outer-wear of kisaeng (courtesan) women and translucent, ramie fabric. This was the boldest set of fusings I’d seen and has always been an inspiration in my own work.
CREDITS:
MODEL: Kelly Diakite
MAKEUP: TBA
SHOOT COORDINATOR: Owusu Rose
HANBOK:
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Michael Hurt
Dr. Michael Hurt (@kuraeji on Instagram) is a photographer and professor living in Seoul. He received his doctorate from UC Berkeley's Department of Ethnic Studies and started Korea's first street fashion blog in 2006. He explores gender and fashion at The Girl Act (Instagram @girlact_official) and also writes on Visual Sociology and Cultural Studies at Deconstructing Korea
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