The Sound of Shamans in the Works of Nam June Paik and Early Korean Video Artists

The Korean shamanistic tradition gave Nam June Paik’s works characteristically Asian cultural features, while western music provided him with audio-visual techniques. Undoubtedly, Paik’s work at West German Radio’s electronic music studio motivated his initiation of a new art form, video art, and invention of a video synthesizer with Shuya Abe in the late 1960s. One can trace the marks of Korean shamanism from Paik’s early works, notably his first video art exhibition, (1963), which featured a bleeding bull’s head. Paik analogized Fluxus Happenings to Korean exorcist rituals as performances in which the shamans communicate with spectators. Paik revealed his identity as an Asian in a series of shamanistic performances coupled with destructive avant-garde gestures. Interestingly, some early Korean video artists share the shamanistic features of Paik’s art. Among them are Hyun-Ki Park, Keun-Byung Yook, Hae-Min Kim, and Chan-Kyong Park. These early Korean video artists, like Paik, perceived a link between video images on monitors and the invocation of spirits in Korean shamanistic rituals. They regarded that artists are shamans or spiritual mediums connecting spectators and the invisible world. Unsurprisingly, then, the sounds and images of Korean exorcist rituals attracted Hae-Min Kim and Chan-Kyong Park whose works are specially reviewed here among other early Korean video artists. This paper focuses on shamanistic features in early Korean video art since Paik’s initiation of video art in the 1960s.

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Mi-Jung Kang

Conference

Publication date: August 2019

Publication date (Print): August 2019

Pages: 110-115

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[0001]Seoul National University

#6-322 College of Humanities, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 08826

Article

DOI: 10.14236/ewic/RESOUND19.18

SO-VID: 61ec6345-9dc7-45c8-8b5b-e8508f08781e

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Conference name: RE:SOUND 2019 – 8th International Conference on Media Art, Science, and Technology

Conference acronym: RE:SOUND 2019

Conference number: 8

Conference location: Aalborg, Denmark

Conference date: August 20-23, 2019

Conference sponsor: Electronic Workshops in Computing (eWiC)

Conference theme: Media Art, Science, and Technology

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1477-9358 BCS Learning & Development

Self URI (article page): https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/RESOUND19.18

Self URI (journal page): https://ewic.bcs.org/

REFERENCES

W. S. Heo 2018 The Influence of Shamanism on Nam June Paik’s Video Art, Moving Image Technology Studies 28 95 113
W. HerzogenrathS. A. Park 2012 Nam June Paik Art Center Interview Project: Wulf Herzogenrath Nam June Paik Art Center Yongin
M. J. Kang 2019 The Passages of Korean Media Arts, Book Korea Sungnam (forthcoming)
R. Krauss 1976 Video: The Aesthetics of Narcissism October 1 50 64
K. Y. Kim 2016 Rewriting the Origin of New Media: History and Postcoloniality in Nam June Paik’s Video Art International Journal of Social Science and Humanity 6 11 896 899
Y. C. Lee 2012 The Founder of Video Art, Nam June Paik and Shamanism https://www.tk21.com/The-Founder-of-Video-Art-NamJun?lang=fr Jul 14 2019
W. K. Lee 2003 A Study on the ‘Interspace’ of Video Installation, Basic Art Studies 4 2 335 343
S. Lim 2012 Aesthetics of Convergence: Nam June Paik’s Early Works in Germany, 1956-1963 Maroniebooks Seoul
M. MacLuhan 1964 Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man The MIT Press
New Music USA, Sound Art Foundation, INC www.newmusicusa.org/profile/billhellermann/ Aug 30 2018
N. J. Paik 2018 Paik: Du Cheval à Christo et autres écrits, Irmeline Leveer & Edith Decker Wang-Jun Lim NJP Artcenter Yongin
C. K. Park 2008 Sindoan http://www.parkchankyong.com/sindoanfilm Jul 25 2019
C. K. Park 2013 Manshin: Ten Thousand Spirits http://www.parkchankyong.com/manshinfilm Jul 25 2019
S. Rennert 2010 About Paik, with Paik: A Collage of Conversations Dating from 1992 to 2010 SookKyung LeeSusanne Rennert Nam June Paik, Tate London 213 217
Y. S. Yook 2017 Nam June Paik’s Performances in German Period (1959-1963) and the Memory of War, Journal of Korean Modern & Contemporary Art History 33 215 245

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[1] W. S. Heo 2018 The Influence of Shamanism on Nam June Paik’s Video Art, Moving Image Technology Studies 28 95 113

[2] W. HerzogenrathS. A. Park 2012 Nam June Paik Art Center Interview Project: Wulf Herzogenrath Nam June Paik Art Center Yongin

[3] M. J. Kang 2019 The Passages of Korean Media Arts, Book Korea Sungnam (forthcoming)

[4] R. Krauss 1976 Video: The Aesthetics of Narcissism October 1 50 64

[5] K. Y. Kim 2016 Rewriting the Origin of New Media: History and Postcoloniality in Nam June Paik’s Video Art International Journal of Social Science and Humanity 6 11 896 899

[6] Y. C. Lee 2012 The Founder of Video Art, Nam June Paik and Shamanism https://www.tk21.com/The-Founder-of-Video-Art-NamJun?lang=fr Jul 14 2019

[7] W. K. Lee 2003 A Study on the ‘Interspace’ of Video Installation, Basic Art Studies 4 2 335 343

[8] S. Lim 2012 Aesthetics of Convergence: Nam June Paik’s Early Works in Germany, 1956-1963 Maroniebooks Seoul

[9] M. MacLuhan 1964 Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man The MIT Press

[10] New Music USA, Sound Art Foundation, INC www.newmusicusa.org/profile/billhellermann/ Aug 30 2018

[11] N. J. Paik 2018 Paik: Du Cheval à Christo et autres écrits, Irmeline Leveer & Edith Decker Wang-Jun Lim NJP Artcenter Yongin

[12] C. K. Park 2008 Sindoan http://www.parkchankyong.com/sindoanfilm Jul 25 2019

[13] C. K. Park 2013 Manshin: Ten Thousand Spirits http://www.parkchankyong.com/manshinfilm Jul 25 2019

[14] S. Rennert 2010 About Paik, with Paik: A Collage of Conversations Dating from 1992 to 2010 SookKyung LeeSusanne Rennert Nam June Paik, Tate London 213 217

[15] Y. S. Yook 2017 Nam June Paik’s Performances in German Period (1959-1963) and the Memory of War, Journal of Korean Modern & Contemporary Art History 33 215 245

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