Han’geul
A permanent installation commissioned by restaurant Perilla: Korean American Fare
This project was realized independently, without a team.
When the restaurant Perilla (Sansoo BBQ back then) commissioned me for a piece on their wall, I wanted to make something that reflects Korea’s rich culture and its unique language system Han’geul using projection mapping.
Han’geul is the name of the Korean alphabets. It is the only written system in the world that has a distinct inventor: King Sejong in 1443. Despite its origins from centuries ago, the alphabet designs are modern and simple, catering to the learning of illiterate masses at the time, as the King intended. It’s been in use ever since.
Here, I took only the consonant collections (the vowel and consonants are separate in Korean) and used them to be the framework. The video content mapped into each letter is a visual play on the shape of the letter as well as a reference to Korean culture in some way.
Here’s “ㄴ” (ni-un), the sound of N. Norebang, which is Korean karaoke, is written next to it. Most Norebang’s in Korea have neon signs like this one, brash and flickering.
This is “ㅂ” (bi-ep), the sound of B. The illustrated flowers are taken from a traditional Korean painting Minwha (민화), frequently portraying chrysanthemums.
“ㅁ” (mi-um) is the sound of M. Myun (면) means noodles, and Ra-Myun is a food that every household in Korea eats—rich or poor, young or old. This one was cooked & filmed by yours truly.
