Urban Planning and Architecture Influenced by International Intellectual Trends during 1950-70s
This study aims to comprehend the significance of the New Seoul Plan and the Han River development under Kim Hyun-ok’s mayoralty in the late 1960s. As a result of reconstructing the Han River development process in detail, focusing on the interaction between related parties, some notable meanings were found. The Han River development was the fruit of transferring the exploitation system of national land and resources in the Japanese colonial period into the American one. As the full flood control of the Han River became possible through technical aid from America, the Seoul Metropolitan Government(SMG) began to dream of changing its riverside into an urban space. With the fast development of New Seoul, the development authority of the Han River was transferred from the ROK’s Ministry of Construction to the SMG, and then the Han River began to be ‘Seoulized’. As president Park Chung-hee and the administrative officers of the SMG imagined Seoul’s new figure modeled after American cities, the areas around the Han River were reinterpreted as the proper environment to develop a modern riverside city such as Manhattan, New York. The planners proposed the new city center around the Han River in order to overturn the old Seoul’s mono-centric structures, and tried to realize their ideal linear city model between Seoul and Incheon. Their challenge failed, however, because the Kyoung-In axis developed from the Japanese colonial period began to decline and the previous geographic cognition on the center and periphery was so strong. The fundamental change the Han River development brought was the emergence of the new city axis along the Han River. It was handled as a minor part of the river development plan, but fully implemented because of its compatibility with reality. That axis became the most important component of new Seoul’s space structure. Lastly, the Han River development was an attempt to transfer the defense space during wartime to the living space during peacetime, though the special status of the Han River as a militarily strategic location left its traces in the new city.
To create a new nation and society, Seoul National University(SNU) was established by combining former Kyungsung Imperial University with ten public colleges in 1946 under the United States Army Military Government in Korea. However, the SNU failed to successfully carry out the reform because the human resource and the space of the former system remained unchanged. After the Korean War, the ‘Minnesota Project’, an American education aid has led SNU to be rebuilt and turned into an American-oriented education system. The SNU Centralization Plan was promoted to complete this transformation. This plan required a specific spatial format called the campus, which emerged from the American cultural background. Under the U.S. influence over South Korea during the Cold War, several planners made proposals to create an American-style campus. The first campus plan in 1958 was proposed by Yoon Chang-sup, an architecture professor at SNU, who has studied abroad in the U.S. His initial plan to pursue the well-organized outer space with proper scale, which was influenced by post-WWII urban planning strategy, was not accepted by the realistic conditions of SNU and the perspectives of local architects. But his ideas were eventually implemented during a final campus plan proposed by an American planner DPUA in 1971. The final plan was developed with the idea of the locality elements of Korea. SNU’s campus planning process was an important event that established the foundation of modern Korean university space as it began to organize outer space rather than to use just building. This suggested modern Korean universities a new view that life in outer space is as important as the life in the classroom.
Changes in Ideology and Spatial Imaginations in North Korea
This study aims to examine the changes in status, meaning, and role of Mt. Geumgang from 1945 to 1998 as it relates to Mt. Myohyang and Mt. Baekdu. After liberation, North Korea established a socialist state with support from the Soviet Union. In 1967, when Kim Il-sung came into power, he purged his political rivals, who were supportive of establishing a socialist state, to politically transition into an autocracy. Originally, Mt. Geumgang was designated to display North Korean socialist ideas, however, its status and plan to use for propaganda purposes shifted to Mt. Myohyang and Mt. Baekdu; gradually it became marginalized as Kim’s Juche ideology was emphasized. Mt. Geumgang instead converted into a space to recall memories of the Korean War, embody anti-American sentiment and to symbolize Kim Jeong-sook’s loyalty to Kim Il-sung, inevitably making Mt. Geumgang no longer a priority place to visit. In the process of being marginalized, Mt. Geumgang took center stage in attracting international tourists as North Korea grappled with overcoming economic difficulty in the 1980s. This process of shifting the focus and significance of Mt. Geumgang reflected North Korea’s deviation from the shadow of the Soviet Union and restructuring the country based on its independent political ideology.
The purpose of this study is to examine how the Mount Geumgang National Park Preparation Plan changed the landscape of Mt. Geumgang during the 1930s. In the early 1930s, the Japanese Government-General of Joseon sought to conserve the landscape of Mt. Geumgang, which had been damaged by increasing tourists and reckless development, by executing a national park plan. Uehara and Tamura, invited Japanese landscape architecture authorities, had contrasting viewpoints for national parks, thereby suggested two different national park preparation plans. Uehara emphasized Inner Geumgang’s traditional scenic spots with old buildings and stories, while Tamura did Outer Geumgang’s modern natural landscape. The final plan adopted both of their plans by applying each to separate zones. This plan was partially implemented and changed the landscape of mountains, although Mt.Geumgang was not designated as a national park as planned. Mt. Geumgang was reorganized by the plan as follows. First, the territory of Mt. Geumgang, which had been ambigous, was confirmed and expanded as a ‘great landscape of granite mountains’. Second, the area of Mt. Geumgang were divided into multiple zones for different purposes. Newly added areas were developed as the zone for physical training of alpinists while highlighting a Mt. Geumgang’s attribute as “unexplored nature.” On the other hand, existing Inner Geumgang and Outer Geumgang areas were developed as the zone for tourists, which had facilities for groups of tourists and motoring roads for the short period sightseeing. New Geumgang was to be developed as a midpoint destination for the upper-class; however, this plan was abandoned as the whole plan was scaled down after 1933. Third, the landscapes of each zones were characterized by the building styles in it. Through this strategy, Outer Geumgang and newely added areas, the base of alpinists, were portrayed as modern and western, whereas Inner Geumgang, the base of tourists, was portrayed as traditional and oriental. These changes are important in that it has an influence on today’s understanding and experience of Mt. Geumgang.