For perfect stroke
Artisan reinvents brushes using plant fibers
JEUNGPYEONG, North Chungcheong Province — Yoo Pill-moo, a traditional brush maker, doesn’t have any apprentices, unlike other artisans. He works alone, making brushes for more than 16 hours a day at his small workshop in Jeungpyeong County in North Chungcheong Province.
“I cannot afford to have apprentices in this small workshop because I have been living hand-to-mouth after the local brush market became dominated by Chinese products in the 1990s,” he said.
Yoo’s monthly income from selling his brushes is less than 1 million won. To supplement this, he gives lectures in cultural centers of the county offices or in schools in the region.
Born in Chungju, North Chungcheong Province, he became fascinated with brush making at the age of 16 after seeing a brush making workshop in his town.
“Back then, in the 1970s, brushes were regarded as precious items. People want to keep them. So I thought if I made brushes, I could become a precious person,” he said.
He apprenticed at a workshop for about 12 years and then opened his first shop in Eumseong, North Chungcheong Province in 1988.
He said at the time, he earned a lot of money from running his own brush shop. But things have changed since Chinese products began replacing Korean ones in almost every industry i n the mid-1990s.
“The price of handmade brushes has been plunging. The current brush price is lower than that 30 years ago. Low prices have become the most important thing in this age,” he said.
In addition, since the financial crisis that swept the nation in 1997, most brush makers like him have closed their shops.
“It was the hardest time in my life. I wanted to give up my job at the time. But I decided to change my way of thinking and working completely because I could not abandon the skills that I worked so hard to learn,” he said.
The artisan began making a small number of high-quality, diverse brushes instead of a large number of ordinary brushes. Previously, he made more than 100 brushes a month, but now, he makes only 40.
“My brushes are not produced on an assembly line. I don’t use any machine to make the brush making process easier. Handmade products are becoming rare. I will stick to making them, whatever the costs,” he said.
“Except for sleeping and eating, I spend my time solely on making brushes because every step is done by hand. It takes much time,” Yoo said.
Making a difference
Making a brush, regardless of its size, requires some 50 steps and at least 15 days to finish. He selects hair, removes the fat, trims them and then mixes them. Then, he divides them into small batches and deftly trims them to remove unwanted hairs and polish the shape before they are bound to a ferrule and attached to a handle.
Through this process, he makes countless brushes, throwing away all but the perfect one.
“Only after I throw away numerous brushes do I get a masterpiece. It is not only a process of manufacturing a brush but also a process of training myself. While making the brushes and throwing them away, I learn how to throw away my greed and selfishness as well,” he said.
Yoo makes brushes with hair — the most typical type — and gives variation to their handles by decorating them with drawings, inscriptions and carvings.
“I think my brushes need to be special. I don’t make the same brush twice. It’s a rule that I have for myself,” he said.
He said for him, a brush handle is like a canvas on which he can draw anything. “These days, people rarely use brushes. So I think users of the brushes are experiencing the changes,” he said.
The artisan embellishes brush handles with various patterns and writings. Some brush handles are inscribed with his favorite poems or are made from adlay nuts.
“Brushes with patterns on their handles are like decorative objects. It’s not easy (to create these handles), but they have already become a signature of my brushes,” he said.
Plant brushes
As it is getting hard to get high-quality hair from animals like sheep in Korea, Yoo has turned to making “chopil,” or brushes with plant fibers, instead of brushes using imported animal hair or artificial hair.
After numerous trials and errors, he successfully made “galpil,” a brush made from a stalk of kudzu, for which he won an award at the Korea Traditional Craft Art Competition in 1996.
“Making a brush with plant fibers is much more difficult and complicated than making a brush with animal hair. But I am sure that the brushes made from plant fibers can help calligraphers and other users produce a different texture,” he said. Chaff, reed, silver grass and virtually any fibrous plant can be used to make brushes. Making brushes with plant fibers takes much longer (three months) than making brushes with animal hair (15 days).
“I usually pound the roots or stalks over 15,000 times to ensure that their fibers are soft enough. Then, I steam and dry them over 10 times,” he said. Yoo said chopil is coarse but creates a unique texture, so many calligraphers prefer to use them over ordinary brushes with animal hair.
“This kind of brush might have been used in ancient times. The plants (used to make the brush) were used in ancient times as alternatives to brushes. We can see this in the film ‘Chihwaseon,’ which shows an artist drawing a picture with a willow branch,” he said.
Yoo explained that chopil is not as strong as brushes with animal hair, but his brushes make up for this weakness through his painstaking experiments.
Artisanship
Like in other traditional crafts, the demand for brushes is on the decline, as indicated by the closing of related university departments in recent years. Wonkwang University, which was the first in the nation to open a calligraphy department, decided to close it in December 2014.
“Today, you can hardly find traditional stationery shops in Insa-dong, which was once home to them. Instead, many coffee shops have opened in recent years. The stationery shop owners cannot make ends meet any more amid soaring rents,” he said.
Yoo said his brushes are never cheap owing to the labor-intensive process. “Sometimes it takes eight months to make a brush. I spend all my energy and time on making it. Frankly speaking, I think it’s not proper to set up a price,” he said.
The artisan said, however, he feels happy and satisfied when making brushes. “It’s so sad that I need to sell my brushes to make a living. Brush making is everything to me. I hope that users appreciate the value of my brushes,” he said.
“While making the brushes and throwing them away, I learn how to throw away my greed and selfishness as well.”