KJCKorea
Journal Central

This study reinterprets the music and thought of Isang Yun through the lens of Donghak thought, with particular attention to the structural affinities between Donghak and Mugung-Dong (1986). While previous studies have primarily interpreted Yun’s music and thought through Daoism, broader East Asian philosophy, or Western humanism, this study proposes Donghak as an interpretive framework for understanding the relationship between his cosmological vision, social engagement, and musical practice in a more integrated manner. The argument unfolds in three stages. First, it examines Yun’s life and historical experiences, suggesting that ideas of life, equality, and resistance embedded in modern Korean society after Donghak were internalized through his personal and historical circumstances. Second, it analyzes his writings on music and culture, revealing a consistent concern with the relationship between music and people, the reconstruction of tradition, and artistic practice as a form of social engagement. Finally, an analysis of Mugung-Dong demonstrates that its rhythmic motives, wave-like structure, and open ending articulate a process of continuous transformation and renewal. The work’s temporal and sonic organization exhibits significant structural affinities with key themes of Donghak thought, particularly its emphasis on life, solidarity, and transformative change. On this basis, the study argues that Donghak provides a productive interpretive framework for understanding Yun’s conception of life, communal solidarity, and transformative agency in music.

Regietheater refers to “director’s theatre,” and when an opera performance is shaped in a new direction distinct from the original work according to the director’s intention, it is termed a “Regietheater opera.” The German theatre scholar Jürgen Kühnel (1944–2018) classified Regietheater staging into four types: symbolic staging, a parodic approach based on the drama, staging that relocates the story to the present era, and staging that reflects the director’s psychological response. The purpose of this study is to examine and analyze the Regietheater opera works of director Soodong Chang in order to understand his directorial perspective. Among his Regietheater works, Seomjingang Naru and Seoul*Orfeo, both performed in 2025, are selected as the subjects of analysis. Both works correspond to Kühnel’s fourth type of Regietheater, namely, staging that does not strictly follow the original narrative but instead reflects the director’s psychological response. The characteristics of Soodong Chang’s Regietheater operas can be summarized in three aspects. First, he secures audience empathy through the transformation of the historical setting. In Seomjingang Naru, the grief of a mother who loses her child and wanders in madness searching for the child is overlapped with the painful past of modern Korean history. In Seoul*Orfeo, the setting of the “present era” and “Gwanghwamun Station of the Seoul subway” relocates the operatic narrative into the lives of contemporary people. Second, there is an active incorporation of Korean elements. In pursuit of the globalization of “K-Opera,” both works utilize Korean stories, Korean names, Korean music, and Korean dance. Third, there is an artistic sublimation of han (a uniquely Korean sentiment of deep-seated sorrow and unresolved grief) embedded in Korean history. To incorporate social issues into opera, the director employs a variety of theatrical devices in these two works to reveal an intention to restore the pain and wounds embedded in Korean history. Over a career spanning more than forty years as an opera director, Soodong Chang has continuously fulfilled the social function of art—illuminating and healing social issues—through his Regietheater operas.

This study examines the patterns of female representation in Korean opera. The findings reveal that Korean opera exhibits distinctive forms of representing women, which can be categorized into six types: first, women as “cultural symbols” within a traditional culture package; second, “victimized women” who experience historical tragedies; third, various forms of female heroes; fourth, “mothers” and “wives” who narrate the achievements of male heroes; fifth, “gisaeng as lovers” of male heroes; and sixth, “weak villainous women” positioned beside male heroes. These six types of female representation appear repeatedly in Korean opera and are closely related to production methods, the discourse surrounding opera creation across different periods, and the intentions of the producers. Specifically, women as “cultural symbols” within a traditional culture package emerged during the early stages of opera production, when efforts were made to combine traditional culture with opera. “Victimized women” appeared in the process through which particular groups sought to publicize historical events and memories. Meanwhile, mothers, wives, gisaeng, and villainous women alongside male heroes emerged in the process of promoting and establishing specific male heroes.