2023-09-27 19:30:06
On Tuesday evening, nine moon bowls were made live on the stage in the Admiralspalast. The Korean Jungok Kim sits in front of a potter’s wheel for around half an hour and makes these bowls with a sunken look. He continues to make pottery when ten dancers suddenly appear behind him and dance with vases, tumbling over each other and trying out complicated lifting figures. A voice can be heard offscreen saying in Korean, German and English: “For the carefree, this vessel becomes a shot glass, for the sick it becomes a medicine glass.”
“Thinking Hand” is the name of the program that was performed for the first time in Berlin on Tuesday evening. In the approximately 90-minute program, Korea’s so-called intangible heritage is brought to the stage: pottery and silk knots. The two traditional handicrafts are elaborately staged with music, dance and light so that they become a happening.
Hyesoon Kim has been tying her famous silk knots for 50 years. Now also in the Admiralspalast. Sören Kittel/BLZ
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Jungok Kim’s family has always made the moon bowls for nine generations, once for the royal court and now for sale. His son also travels the world with him and demonstrates pottery on stage. The performance highlights the meditative effect of this often monotonous work: “While I wait to form good vessels and capture nature,” it says again in three languages, “I cast off my greed and empty my mind.” First This is how a vessel is created.
Respect for tradition and love for grand gestures
There is definitely a tradition in Asia of turning everyday things into a big spectacle. On the one hand, this has to do with Confucianism and the associated respect for elders and tradition, but also with the love of grand gestures. At the beginning of the event, the ambassador comes on stage and announces that there will soon be several Korean events to celebrate 140 years of German-Korean relations.
It’s almost a shame that wood carving from the Erzgebirge, glassblowing from Thuringia or Saxon stollen baking weren’t also staged on stage. The knot maker Hyesoon Kim sat there, tying a teardrop-shaped decorative knot using green and red threads. Behind her, the stars of the Korean State Ballet danced the Dance of the Silkworm. Ms. Kim says, “Nodes are like human relationships.”
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