조선시대 朱子 崇慕熱과 그 이미지의 시각화 양상

Abstract

Neo-Confucianism functioned as both the philosophical basis of government during the Chosŏn dynasty and the ideology that dominated the thoughts and lives of the country's ruling classes. The emergence of the Sarim faction of scholars in the 16th century brought deeper scholastic understanding of Neo-Confucianism and increasingly passionate veneration of Zhu Xi(1130~1200), the Southern Song scholar who synthesized its fundamental concepts. Many books explaining Zhu's thoughts and his life were published and distributed, while an increasing number of dedicated spaces for performing sacrificial rites to him were added to Confucian academies and shrines. This was accompanied by a trend among literati nationwide of recreating the Nine-Bend Stream (jiuqu; the stream in China's Wuyi Mountains by which Zhu lived and studied) and reading Zhu's poetry and other writings. Particularly notable is the constant visualization of Zhu's image, either through direct representation or aspirational emulation. Zhu Xi's symbolic image was projected in the form of book illustrations, picture albums of saints, and portraits used in sacrificial rites or shrines. His appearance and attire were appropriated from those found in Chinese visual materials, and he was depicted in a variety of postures and styles. Portraits of Zhu in the style fashionable among Chosŏn artists at the time also appeared. Among these were several works combining portraits with self-encomia, demonstrating that Chosŏn literati understood portraits of Zhu as inseparable from his teaching. Paintings of the Nine-Bend Stream in the Wuyi Mountains of Fujian Province, China (wuyi jiuqu tu; mui gugok do), which can be regarded as emulative images of Zhu Xi, were generally painted with reference to icons found in Ming and Qing woodcut prints. Like portrait paintings, however, they were regarded as a means of communing with Zhu. Narrative paintings that showed scenes from Zhu's life were produced and used in a similar manner. However, no "pictures of the holy traces of Zhu Xi" in the style of existing "pictures of the holy traces of Confucius" were painted in either Chosŏn or China; this is assumed to be due to the custom of differentiating hierarchically between historical sages. Chosŏn-era images of Zhu Xi were thus created and used, based on existing visual materials, as a result of the desire among Chosŏn literati to commune with him.