The literary critic Lym Wha recently claimed that modern literature is the product of transplantation. In the last century, one line of enquiry in the study of Korean literature attempted to overcome this thesis by establishing a sense of literature as something spontaneous and attentive to its own practices rather than as transference or transplant. I am required to address a range of discussions on transplantation theory and intrinsic development theory, and the differences between literature and architecture in detail, before I can begin to talk about a thesis of modern Korean architecture. Here, however I will skip the intermediate position and transform and radicalize that thesis on the pretext of insufficient space. Modern architecture is the product of transplantation. Modern architecture is transplanted not only to Korea, but also to Japan, United States, France, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Spain and everywhere. Modern architecture did not emerge from a single origin and spread to other places. It developed in its own way in each region, prompting conflicts with existing styles. Modern architecture was consciously created and cultivated. Their starting points -- the role of key agents and the particular character of development -- may differ considerably, but I can state with confidence that there is no single case that spontaneously emerges within a community, regardless of the definition of such a unit as region, city, or country, to naturally replace the dominant architectural style. Modern architecture is the result of deliberate design activities and ideologically informed creation. It was ideology that preceded real world application, and the so-called precedents or reference points that seemingly propelled modernism. The bigger this gap was thought to be, the greater the anxiety about and desire for a modern architecture.
Modern architecture needed a platform as a springboard in order to fill this perceived gap between the present and the future, and win the culture war; it was a bundle of paper printed with typed paragraphs that provided the answer. Magazines were arguably the most important platform for the dissemination of cultural knowledge in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, spreading and solidifying the reception and growing impression of a new architecture. Historic architectural magazines, many of which are still published today, such as Architectural Record in the US (Founded in 1891), Architectural Review in the UK (1896), Casabella (1928) and Domus (1928) in Italy, and L'Architecture d'Aujourd'hui (1930) in France, have all provided channels through which to modern architecture permeates numerous markets and societies, as well as collective spaces for architects and critics. Many avant-garde movements between the two world wars needed magazines to announce their pioneering theoretical convictions and to circulate their manifesto statements or critical principles as activists or anarchists in the cultural sphere. It is difficult to imagine the existence and continued relevance of movements such as Bauhaus, G, and De Stijl without magazines.
This is no different in Korea. Modern architecture cannot exist without media engagement and broader public discourse. Joseon and Architecture (1922) was published during the Japanese colonial period, but there were sharp restrictions placed on the journal of the Joseon Architecture Association, which was run by a group of Japanese architects in Korea. After Korea was liberated, Housing was founded by the Korea Housing Administration (July 1959), Architect by the Korean Institute of Architects (April 1961), and Architect by the Korea Institute of Registered Architects (July 1966). It was only natural that the Korea Housing Administration, the largest architectural outfit in Korea at the time, would also try to accrue and disseminate knowledge through the medium of the magazine. However, to control the demand for and discourse around 'architecture', which was at that time exploding, was beyond the capacity and aims of the Korea Housing Administration’s magazine, fixated as they were on building ‘better houses, cheaper and greater in number’. This was stated by Kim Yun-ki, the chairman of the board, in their first issue, in consideration of aspects such as its specific set of themes and its niche readership. The limitations of the two Architect magazines were not that different. In the preface for the magazine Contemporary Architecture, which was discontinued after the publication of only its second issue in 1960, Kim Jae-cheol, the chairman of Korean Institute of Architects, noted ‘I am overwhelmed to pick up Contemporary Architecture, a pure architectural magazine long-awaited by those in our architectural world [...] It is because of this significant position that it has presents an “epochal moment” to the history of Korean architecture and to the wider cultural movement’. However, this passionate desire to declare a new ‘epoch’, which means the beginning of a new age, for Korean architectural theory and practice through this new ‘pure and comprehensive architectural magazine’ was one that had to be put on hold until
As many has long wished, this magazine was the dawning of a new era. Since its foundation in 1966, Space has been the 20th-century’s all-encompassing platform for Korean contemporary architecture. Covering the visual arts, such as painting and sculpture, as well as the performing arts, such as dance and theatre, Space has contributed to broader understandings of modern architecture to readers from across the arts, expanding the field of exchange between all cultural practitioners, educators and theorists. It was one of the few channels to provide information to Koreans about developments in international contemporary architecture in Japan, USA, northern Europe, and South America. Above all, it provided opportunities to raise and answer the question that had dominated all sectors in Korea throughout the past century: 'What is “Koreanness”?' These activities were linked to the magazine Space, but sometimes they were also pursued through other media and platforms such as forums, lectures, and field trips held by the architectural firm SPACE. Such activities were not exclusively carried out by SPACE, but there are few instances or occasions that could be considered comparable to the kind offeed by SPACE, which draw upon the cultural influence and extensive network established through the magazine.
While SPACE has had a significant impact on Korean culture, it has also cast a dark shadow. SPACE was not immune to the vicissitudes and changing fortunes of an architectural firm – after all, it was published by an architectural firm and not by a publisher. SPACE failed to transition from its atelier-like sensitivity to greater engagement with wider social change. It is difficult for us to analyse the technical and industrial aspects of architecture or the dynamic changes to Korean society over time through the magazine SPACE. The medium and platform had already decided on its content and the intended direction of the magazine. The following platforms began to gradually expand the scope and social significance of architecture: the design magazine Decoration founded in 1977 dealt with form and the aesthetic aspects of architecture, Architectural Culture published in 1981 often focused on the architectural market and industry, and C3 (formerly Korean Architects founded in 1985 contributed to strengthening critical discourses. This was the consequence of an expanding architectural world. While the number of colleges and universities teaching architecture numbered only 17 when SPACE was first published in 1966, C3 could safely assume students and graduates from 56 universities would count among its primary readers.
The driving force behind these magazines was the difference between the mainstream and the fringe activities. It was highly likely that events taking place throughout the architectural world, in USA, Europe, and Japan (the most internationally influential regions) would find their footing in Korea at a delay. The significance of these magazines often laid with their capacity for capturing issues and features likely to be popular in Korea in advance, and their ability to introduce them with clarity to Korean readers. Using these platforms as springboards, practices were forced to play catch up with these international front-runners. This process was not at all awkward, as they clearly recognised that there was a clear discrepancy in ability between production and reproduction. The imported architectural trends from more advanced countries, such as Metabolism, Brutalism, Postmodernism, and Deconstructionism, were subjects of a lively curiosity and even something to be overcome. Until the late 1980s, magazines provided the opportunity for Korean architecture to reaffirm its modernist approach through its own positions in constrast to that of others. In other words, magazines recognised and paid a consistent attention to the differences and to refining one's identity based on these points of difference and individual attitude. When various theories and discourses multiplied, along with sudden transformations in Korean society in the late 1980s, it was necessary to fundamentally reset the roles taken by the existing platforms, diverting the water stream by controlling the level difference. It is no coincidence that various movements in the early 1990s, including the Young Architects Association and the 4.3 Group, tried to forge new platforms outside of the existing mainstream, media-centred ones. However, even they preferred print media and xerography as their means of distribution as opposed to the emerging alternatives. All kinds of meetings, from seminars to field trips, had to produce printed documentation as record. The papers registered their activities and acted as invitations to the next meeting.
The turn of the century was a time in which the topography of the discourse, which had long formed a single mountain, came to be divided into many hills. This was a process through which the differences in height between cultural peaks translated into decreasing delays in their reception throughout the world, or perhaps we gradually became insensitive to such differences or time lags. The platform was no longer a springboard. It was a time when the level difference over which we felt we must leap gradually disappeared, or we didn’t feel the need to do so as sharply as before. It was also a time of immersion in exterior views from where we were, instead of prioritising shifts to other spaces and places. Mailing services that every morning sent out these descriptions and images of pioneering work from around the world and the SNS that emphasised how our present time shared so much with others rather than promoting an awareness of our unique profile and range of difference elevated the platform itself to an economic model. Digital networks have installed a uniform capitalism and perception of our situation facing the same crisis, of so-called contemporaneity. From field trips for members of a specific architectural firm to forums for general enthusiasts who did not major in architecture, meetings between interested parties differ in format, aims, method, and number of participants. However, all prefer walking a path around a hilly panorama than discovering and climbing a single solitary mountain. I do not have a desire to build an observation deck that will allow me see a whole. By adopting that keen sense of a new place, which is no longer subject or aware of a perceived ‘time difference’, I am,creating a window that looks out on the now from where I am. Now is the time to start asking what it is that I can see through this window.