This special exhibition that presents shamanism relics collected by Namgang (pen name) Kim Taegon. He was the folklorist and studied of Korean shamanism. From 1960, he conducted the field research various types of gut, shamanistic rituals and rites and collected disappearing shamanism data as well. In 2012, his wife Son, Jang-yeon donated a total of 31,742 items of Paintings of the Spirits, Shaman’s ritual costumes and equipments, photographs and films at the National Folk Museum of Korea(NFMK). Thus, NFMK publishes collection book, "In Search of the Arche-patterns of Korean Culture" and opens this special exhibition to tribute to the meaning of his donation.

In this exhibition, it consists of four themes as follow:
I.Who Is Kim Taegon?
II.Record of the Spiritual World
III.Record of Communicating with the Sprits
IV.Searching for Shamanistic Spirits in North

We hope our visitors will understand of Korean shamanism and the folklorist Kim Taegon who was devoted to Korean shamanism throughout his entire life as respectable scholar and as being himself in this exhibition.

I. Who Is Kin, Taegon?

As the folklorist Kim Taegon was also the scholar of Korean literature at the same time; he continued to conduct the field research at ritual sites and studied on the subject of Korean folklore. He wrote 34 books, including "Painting of the Spirits in Korea" and over 200 academic journals and articles such as "Study of Hwang Cheonmuga." When he was a university student as himself, he was interested in folklore studies so that he traveled and visited different ritual sites around Korea. After his efforts to study on Korean folklore, he carried out the arche-pattern concept. This perspective is his original notion that every existences remain through rotating each other based on distinction(good and bad)and remaining eternally. Later, he tried to approve of his idea and to apply it to the nature of shamanism in Korea.

Moreover, he expanded his study of folklore into Mongolia and Siberia regions but his love of studying folklore had to stop due to his sudden death in 1996 when he was 61 years old. However, his remaining academic journals and writings would be continued studying of Korean Shamanism tradition by his students and his fellow scholars.

II. Record of Communicating with the spirits

The Shamanism is a religion that focuses on solving the problems of reality through communication between humans and the spiritual imagery with shamans acting as liaisons. Thus,
Kim Taegon paid attention to how people communicated with the Gods and tried to understand of the origin of shamanism through conducting the field research on ritual sites. His research equipments such as notes, photographs, films and research findings reveal his efforts to search for shamanism. In 1972, he filmed namijanggunsadangje, registered as Seoul City’s Intangible Cultural Asset no. 20. It was the village gut of youngmundong in Seoul that being passed down from the olden times and brought together local villagers. Unfortunately, namijanggunsadangje was disappeared by 1972. However, the remaining record of the ritual ceremony of namijanggunsadangje in his film and his research later helped to reconstruct the ritual ceremony in 1983.

III. Recording the Spiritual World

As the Gods are personifications of natural forces, they are invisible. Thus, human beings try to communicate with the Gods with using tangible objects such as shrines, painting of theGods, ritual equipments, ritual costumes and ritual sings. The gut, shamanistic rituals and rites, is in which the shaman offers a sacrifice to the sprits andthrough speaking and performance. They wear ritual costume and carry ritual equipments in front of painting of the spirits to pray them to intercede in the fortune of the world in the shrine or other places. Kim Taegon collected a variety of paintings of the Gods and shaman’s ritual equipments when he conducted shamanism research. Here, visitors can see his shamanism collection in this exhibition.

IV. Searching for Shamanistic Spirits in North

Kim Taegon realized in need of conducting the field research in Siberia area as he read books about shamanism when he worked as a guest professor at university of Copenhagen in Denmark from 1982 to 1983. He conducted research on the shamanism in Mongolia,Siberia and other countries to find out the root in the ethnic culture though comparisons and similarities between Korean culture and continent culture since 1990. During his research in Siberia over a span of seven times, he ended his life on 25th of January in 1996due to the sudden illness. Still, his last unfinished research paper called, "Study of Affinitiesbetween Korean Folklore and Northern Continent Folklore" on his desk.