Calligraphy by Bak Se-dang

The three albums (top, middle and bottom) of "Calligraphy by Bak Se-dang, Bequeathed Ink of Seogye" (西溪遺墨) preserve the calligraphy of Seogye Bak Se-dang (1629–1703), a renowned scholar-official of the seventeenth century, written for his disciple Yi Jeong-sin (1660–1727). The top album contains poems Bak Se-dang composed himself in reply to Yi Jeong-sin's verses, together with Chinese poems and prose expressing a love of nature and a wish to keep distance from a corrupt world. The middle and bottom albums consist mainly of personal letters (ganchal) sent to Yi Jeong-sin — twenty-nine in the middle album and twenty-five in the bottom album (one letter in the middle album is addressed to his brother-in-law Nam Gu-man, and six letters in the bottom album are by Bak Tae-bo). They were written between 1679 and 1702, and most are not included in the Seogyejip, the collected works of Seogye. Of particular note among them are a passage in which Bak Se-dang asks Yi Jeong-sin to view and critique Chinese albums of painting and calligraphy, and a letter in which Bak Tae-bo discusses the various matters involved in producing the "Portrait of Seogye". The top album vividly conveys Bak Se-dang's love of nature along with his distinctive calligraphic style. The letters in the middle and bottom albums, meanwhile, preserve not only a record of the teacher-student relationship between Bak Se-dang and Yi Jeong-sin, but also valuable information on the appreciation of painting and calligraphy and on the making of portrait paintings.

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Where it is

Region

Seongnam, Gyeonggi

Designation

Treasure · 보물