friendly tiger - canvas

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Do tiger images have meaning in Korea?

Geographically, Korea has many mountainous regions where many tigers have lived since ancient times. Since tigers are often found in the mountains, unlike the dragons in the legend, they are not abstract but concrete and often the subject of paintings. In reality, tigers are fearsome animals, but the tigers depicted in folk paintings are very cheerful and not scary, but friendly and humorous like a cat. Therefore, the tiger is portrayed as a friendly animal in Korean folk tales and folk images.

There are several reasons why the image of the tiger became the subject of folk tales and folk images.

Firstly, it expresses the socio-critical consciousness of the Joseon Dynasty through humor, and the tiger symbolizes a nobleman, while the magpie, which was often drawn together with the tiger, represents the common people as a satirical image, and the rabbit symbolizes the merchants.

Secondly, at the beginning of the new year, the tiger image, which was used to drive away evil spirits by sticking it on the front or back door of the house, was drawn with a dignified but playfully humorous expression. For this purpose, the tiger image has a protective meaning to prevent disaster and preserve happiness.

The reason why it was painted in a humorous and emotional manner, although with the meaning of scaring away ghosts rather than having a satirical meaning, is probably because it is an image that is placed around the house every day and must be inhabited together.

From a religious perspective, in Confucianism, the tiger is an animal that helps people or returns people's favor by being touched by human piety. In shamanic belief, the tiger is depicted in connection with the worship of mountain gods or the ideology of the four gods. In Buddhism it is also associated with the mountain gods, a belief native to Korea, and tigers are worshiped as messengers of the mountain gods or as mountain gods in all temples.

In popular images, the tiger does not have a wild and fierce appearance, but rather a smiling, sometimes silly, comical appearance. Believing that he ward off evil spirits, he took a place in households and naturally became a friendly and sympathetic figure.

The Mural printed on a canvas "friendly tiger" has been carefully restored by artlia.

Those

• Original title: Tiger
• Artist: unknown 
• Date: Approx. 1955
• Format: painted on our own Korean paper
• Original size: 82 x 54 cm
• Genre: Korean Folk Painting (Minhwa, 민화) 

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