Creative processes......

When doing a project it's always a very creative process when you come to choosing the types and colours of the papers you want to use and then the patterns or designs that will embellish it.

It's interesting being in a Hanji group and seeing how the same project can look so different when completed by different 'Hanji artists'. I use this term 'Hanji artist' because we are all creating our pieces dependant on our own creative experiences and each person uses different colours and design based on those experiences.

I find that my work tends to have an Asian influence after spending more than a decade living and working in both South East Asia and the Far east. I was taught by a Korean lady who was very traditional in her methods of doing this craft. She would never use masking tape for the joints but instead we had to cut small strips of white paper and place them over the joints to smooth them out. We couldn't use wallpaper paste to put the paper on so we had to use flour and water paste, which only lasted a day or so before it started to smell. She was a purist and took her craft very seriously and although at times the work could have been done more quickly using other methods I greatly admired her and am glad I had the opportunity to learn the 'hard' way first.

Some in my group have more western backgrounds and they express themselves using more modern, bright and bold colours. They enjoy being creative and putting their special touch to the hanji pieces. Others are hesitant to choose either plain colours or paper printed with designs in case they make a wrong decision and they regret it later. We are all different but in the end it doesn't matter what our processes or backgrounds are as long as we are creating and enjoying what we're doing.

I have several books of patterns and a folder that contains photocopies of designs I use often. I'm always searching for more ideas and I stash them away for that special piece of hanji I'm going to do very soon.

Here is what I created this week. This fish design is used a lot in hanji but I hadn't used it before so I cut it out and placed it directly over some printed paper.

Fish design

Design on the lid

Comments

Lotus symbol in Korean culture .....

In traditional Korean Hanji art you can see many different designs of plants, animals, letters and insects. I'm sure you've wondered what they all symbolise as they are repeated so often and in many different ways. In this post I just want to take a brief look at the lotus plant and what it symbolises for the Korean people. I've used this design on a few articles but I never really knew the full meaning of what it represented until I started doing some research for my book. Even though many of us aren't Korean we can still use these designs and in so doing, translate a deeper meaning to our articles. Here are a just a few of my favourites from the easiest to the more difficult to cut out. The lotus flower symbolises creation, birth, liveability and reproduction and therefore it's one of the most important symbols in both Korean culture a...

The Buddhist symbol, Hanji & Korean culture ....

When selecting designs for my Hanji pieces I tend to make stylistic choices as to what will look best on each piece but the Korean designs all have very deep symbolic meanings. None more than the Buddhist swastika (manja) design. ‘Manja’ (만, Man is “卍” and 만자, Manja literally means “letter Man”) is also called Srivatsalksana in Sanskrit. It is one of the thirty-two (32) marks of excellence of the Buddha and is said to exist on his hands, feet, hair and waist. For those of us in the West this is often confused with the German Nazi swastika symbol but in fact it's been around for about three thousand years. The swastika is an equilateral cross with arms bent at right angles and all in the same direction, usually to the right, or clockwise. It's a symbol of prosperity and good fortune and it originally represented the revolving sun, fire, or life. The word swastik...

HANJI TRIVIA - Punjabi 'Hanji' .......

When researching about Hanji I've come across many sites that relate to the word 'hanji' being used in Punjabi, one of the Indian languages. There's a band called 'Cornershop' that made a CD in 1997 called, "When I was Born for the Seventh Time' and at the beginning of the song, which I believe was originally sung in Punjabi, they use the word Hanji. In Punjabi both 'han' and 'ji' mean yes. When talking informally to a person they use 'han' but if speaking to an elder or a person with a superior status then they put the two words together and say 'hanji'. You just never know when this word might be used ......

Hanji Happenings

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