• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.100-121
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• 2023

This paper examines the interior settings of a chamber and of a temporary place of enshrinement at Yeonghuijeon (永禧殿, Hall of Eternal Happiness), the representative official portrait hall in which portraits of early and late Joseon kings were enshrined. Also, it discusses the features of the Five Peak screens used therein. The physical environment of a chamber at Yeonghuijeon mainly consisted of a four-panel folding screen with a painting of Five Peaks and a large wooden platform, which was adorned with dragon and lion patterns and attached to lotus-leaf column balustrades. The Five Peak screen was installed on a large platform in the shape of ⊓, spreading across the second and third panels on the back and folding out on the first and fourth panels on the right and left sides. When a portrait was enshrined in a temporary place, a simpler and smaller platform with railings was used. A four-panel folding screen of the Five Peak painting was installed in the same way as in a chamber, but was unfolded around a smaller platform behind it. A royal portrait was displayed in each chamber, whereas a case in which a portrait was rolled up was put on the smaller platform in a temporary place. The Five Peak screens for a chamber and a temporary place were all large four-panel folding screens with two wide panels in the middle and two narrow panels on each side, and only strips of silk were mounted on the four edges of the screens without additional wide lower-side mountings. While screens for the chamber used patterned silk for mounting and white paper for backing on screen frames, screens for the temporary place used plain silk and recycled failed test papers for mounting and backing, respectively. By examining records in the literature on the Five Peak screens for Yeonghuijeon, this paper highlights two Five Peak screens, both of which lost their provenance from the hall. The structures of the two screens reflected the way they were to be installed at the hall. Furthermore, this paper assumes that a Five Peak screen, which had been unfolded on the throne in the main hall of Changdeokgung Palace after the 1960s, was produced in 1858 for the purpose of temporarily enshrining King Sunjo's portrait due to the fact that failed test papers of the 1840s were laid taut over the frame.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.243-263
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• 2022

The royal court of Joseon had a tradition of mounting the Irworobongdo, a painting of the sun, the moon and the five sacred peaks, symbols of the king's immortal presence and authority, on a folding screen and placing it in special spaces within the palace that were reserved for the king. While the Irworobongdo is generally accepted as the important ceremonial object of the royal palaces of Joseon, there have been few studies on the various folding screens used in the royal palaces, largely because the official records about such screens do not match the remaining original relics. In this study, the main discussion is focused on the diversity of the shapes and mounting materials of the Irworobongdoused for various ceremonies held in the royal palaces of Joseon based on the Uigwe, the official records of the royal protocols of the Joseon dynasty. The discussion also extends to the theme rarely studied so far, namely the original form of the Irworobongdo and its evolution in the following period. The ceremonial "five peak" folding screens (Obongbyeong) used at a number of important palace buildings, including the crown hall (Jeongjeon), royal funerary hall (Binjeon), spirit hall (Honjeon) and portrait shrine (Jinjeon), differed in shape and size from the folding screens used in royal celebratory events such as banquets, although the paintings themselves and the style of mounting them were essentially the same. The paintings were mounted on screens bordered with green silk and ornamented with floral gilt designs. The folding screens used in royal ceremonies were produced according to strict guidelines that required the ceremonies and mounting materials to be graded on the basis of the status of each screen. It was not until the 1960s that these ceremonial folding screens of the Joseon dynasty, which had been neglected during the period of Japanese colonial rule of Korea, began to undergo conservation treatment provided as part of a heritage preservation program. Unfortunately, many of the screens repaired in this period lost some of their original features - largely due to the use of non-traditional mounting techniques. Considering, however, that significant achievements have since been made in the heritage preservation field based on the use of historical evidence, it is now necessary to systematically use the repair history of the information about the remaining royal ceremonial folding screens to ensure that they are preserved and managed more effectively in the future.