• Journal of architectural history
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.49-62
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• 2023

This research aims to investigate Park Kilyong's architectural theory and critique of Gyeongseong (Seoul) buildings, expressed in his 'Overview of Modern Buildings in Gyeongseong' and 'Critique of Gyeongseong Buildings' (Samcheolli, Sept. and Oct. 1935); and 'Architectural Form of the 100% Function' and 'The Modern and Architecture (1)-(4)' (Dong-A Daily, 28 Jul. to 1 Aug. 1936). As a result, it is confirmed that Park had the functionalist theory of modern architecture, which suggests that Korean architects of the Japanese colonial period were accommodating the contemporary trend of world architecture. However, Park shows his fundamental limitations in the fact that the main content of his articles was a verbatim translation of two Japanese references (Kurata, 1927; Ishihara, 1929) without proper indications. Despite the limitations, his texts are still meaningful since he formed his own architectural theory on the basis of what he translated; and indeed his critique of Gyeongseong buildings, however simple, was based on the theory. This research makes a critical analysis of Park's functionalist theory from both the 1930s' and present points of view and compares his commentaries on Gyeongseong architecture with those by Ko Yu-seop (1932) and Hong Yunsick (1937), illustrating how Korea perceived architecture and modernism in 1930s.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.8 no.1 s.18
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• pp.63-80
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• 1999

Poet, Yi-sang, born in 1910, originally studied architecture in Kyeong Sung High Technical School. He also experienced an architectural practice in Chosun Chongdokbu (the Government office of Japanese empire in Korea) during 4 years. After resigned the post of architectural engineer in 1933, he became a man of letters. Until his death in 1937, he published the writings hard to understand, which remind us of the works of western avant-garde. Because of the peculiarity and difficulty of his poem and novels, he becomes the object of studies by many critics and historians of literature. And he is estimated as the representative of Korean modernism. This study tries to related Yi-sang's early poems to architectural discourse for the search of 'modernity' of Korean modern architecture. His early poems, which is published in from 1931 to 1933, are worthy of notice because they contained a acute shock derived from radically changed spacial structure, the absolute emptiness of the individual happened in the 1930's Seoul. They also show a different attitude from the writings of Park Dongjin and Park Kilryong, the architects contemporary with Yi-Sang. Compared with their writings, Yi sang's early poems had an insight into the totality of modern culture like western avant-gardes. Therefore Yi-sang's early poems can give us a good base to understand the characteristics of 'modernity' of Korean architecture.