Lot Essay
Among the various traditional subjects of Korean screen paintings, Shipjangsaeng, "The Ten Signs of Long Life," is the quintessential theme, embodying as it does all of the most popular and potent Taoist-Shamanist symbols for long life and happiness.
The ten symbols usually depicted in a Shipjangsaeng screen are the sun, clouds, water, rocks, deer, cranes, tortoises, pine trees, bamboo, and pulloch'o, the mythical sacred fungus.
The sun, clouds, water and rocks were conventionally perceived as eternal.
According to the mythology of Chinese Taoism, exported to Korea in early times, deer were the messengers and companions of the Immortals. The stag and doe exchanging loving glances symbolize happy marriage and the stag and fawns, some of whom are sprouting antlers to show that they are male, show that fathering children, especially boys, was considered a means of achieving immortality.
Similarly, cranes were the mounts on which the Immortals traveled to and from their mythical islands in the Eastern Sea.
Giant sea turtles sometimes live for several centuries. Mythical Taoist tortoises were said to live ten-thousand years and serve as the messengers of the Dragon King.
Pine trees stay green through the winter. Resisting harsh wind, ice and snow, they sometimes live for hundreds of years. Bamboo also remains green in the winter. Like a Confucian gentleman faced with adversity, bamboo bows before the wind but never breaks.
The red fiddleheads rising on short stalks just above the ground across the screen represent pulloch'o, the mythical sacred fungus of Taoism. Pulloch'o is a sort of magic mushroom said to bestow immortality on those who eat it.
Because of their magical efficacy, the ten longevity symbols naturally enjoyed tremendous popularity in all levels of Korean society during the Choson era. They appear in all the decorative arts including painting and ceramics. Although the Taoist immortality cult and its iconography, including these ten symbols, were developed in China, this particular grouping in one single object is unique to Korea.
The ten symbols usually depicted in a Shipjangsaeng screen are the sun, clouds, water, rocks, deer, cranes, tortoises, pine trees, bamboo, and pulloch'o, the mythical sacred fungus.
The sun, clouds, water and rocks were conventionally perceived as eternal.
According to the mythology of Chinese Taoism, exported to Korea in early times, deer were the messengers and companions of the Immortals. The stag and doe exchanging loving glances symbolize happy marriage and the stag and fawns, some of whom are sprouting antlers to show that they are male, show that fathering children, especially boys, was considered a means of achieving immortality.
Similarly, cranes were the mounts on which the Immortals traveled to and from their mythical islands in the Eastern Sea.
Giant sea turtles sometimes live for several centuries. Mythical Taoist tortoises were said to live ten-thousand years and serve as the messengers of the Dragon King.
Pine trees stay green through the winter. Resisting harsh wind, ice and snow, they sometimes live for hundreds of years. Bamboo also remains green in the winter. Like a Confucian gentleman faced with adversity, bamboo bows before the wind but never breaks.
The red fiddleheads rising on short stalks just above the ground across the screen represent pulloch'o, the mythical sacred fungus of Taoism. Pulloch'o is a sort of magic mushroom said to bestow immortality on those who eat it.
Because of their magical efficacy, the ten longevity symbols naturally enjoyed tremendous popularity in all levels of Korean society during the Choson era. They appear in all the decorative arts including painting and ceramics. Although the Taoist immortality cult and its iconography, including these ten symbols, were developed in China, this particular grouping in one single object is unique to Korea.