Shaman Paintings and Old Shaman of Korea
By Laurel kendall
Chair of the Division of Anthropology at the American Museum of Natural History
*Shaman Painting: God Pictures in Korean Contexts
Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 6:30 - 8:00PM
Korean Cultural Center New York
460 Park Avenue, 6th Floor, NYC
Free admission
AHL Foundation Public Lecture Series 2018
In Collaboration with Korean Cultural Center New York
Image with the permission of the Gahoe Museum
What makes a shaman painting sacred? Can these art pieces ever be anything but magical? Dr. Laurel Kendall navigates the journey of shaman paintings as they pass hands from painters to shamans to art collectors. Join us to examine the boundary between the art world and tangible aspects of religious practice.
Dr. Laurel Kendall explores the divine nature of Korean shaman paintings in her book, God Pictures in Korean Contexts: The Ownership and Meaning of Shaman Paintings, co-authored by Jongsung Yang, Director of the Museum of Shamanism in Seoul, and YulSoo Yoon, Founder and Director of the Gahoe Museum.
About the Speaker
Laurel Kendall is Chair of the Division of Anthropology and Curator of Asian Ethnographic Collections at the American Museum of Natural History, Adjunct Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University, and president of the Association for Asian Studies. Dr. Kendall began her long acquaintance with South Korean life in 1970 as a U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer, when a chance encounter with female shamans led her to subsequent anthropological fieldwork. Her Shamans, Nostalgias, and the IMF: South Korean Popular Religion in Motion (University of Hawaii Press, 2009) offers a 30-year perspective on people described in Shamans, Housewives, and other Restless Spirits: Women in Korean Ritual Life (1985) and The Life and Hard Times of a Korean Shaman (1988). In 2010, Korean colleagues awarded Shamans, Nostalgias, and the IMF the first Yim Suk Jay Prize recognizing a work of anthropology about Korea by a non-Korean. In 2007 the International Society for Shamanic research gave Dr. Kendall a lifetime achievement award.
Shaman Paintings and Old Shaman of Korea is
presented as a part of Korean Culture Day 2018 for October Program
