Historical Reenactment of Goryeo Cheongja

Goryeo Celadon has transformed into Buncheong Sagi (Celadon), that was made all over Korea since the end of the 14th century, and has been transformed into Celadon with the glaze on the produced Baekja (White Porcelain) clay until the 17th century in the Joseon Dynasty. However, Celadon has barely maintained its existence without further production since the mid Joseon Dynasty. Then, Goryeo Celadon has been reproduced by ceramic divisions from the Yi Wang-jik Art Production Center, divisions of pottery from the Industrial Inheritance School, and Japanese-run ceramic factories since the Japanese colonial era, which has led to the production of Goryeo Celadon tailored to Japanese preferences, causing Korean’s traditions to vanish.

As ground and excavation investigations have been conducted for the kiln sites of Celadon around Gangjin-gun from Japanese colonial era to 1960s, not only of importance with academic values of Celadon kiln sites, but also with Goryeo Celadon suddenly gaining a lot of attention from Ganjin residents, calling for the reenactment of Goryeo Celadon.

In 1977 the “Celadon Reenactment Project Promotion Committee” was launched in order to reenact Goryeo Celadon. As the first reenacted Celadon was completed from the fire wood kiln in February 1978, the reenactment of Goryeo Celadon started in Gangjin.

Gangjin-gun opened the “Goryeo Celadon Project Office” in 1986 to facilitate the reenactment project of Goryeo Celadon and set up the "Bohogak" to preserve the Site No. 41 in Sadang-ri that was excavated along with the small-scale exhibition hall. The Goryeo Celadon Project Office has expanded facilities to reenact Goryeo Celadon and amassed the reenactment skills, which led to the self-development of glaze without using crazing and baking methods to increase the intensity for Celadon, which was produced in the mid Goryeo Dynasty.

Gangjin-gun sparing no research and development cost and subsidies, to increase the size of and facilitating the Celadon Reenactment Project after the 2000s, resulted in the remarkable growth of Celadon reenactment project with the active operations of individual kilns. Dankook University, Ceramics Technology Institute, and Gangjin-gun have established the foundation for the reenactment of Gangjin Celadon through the joint research foundation establishment project for the globalization and sophistication of Celadon.