Ancestral Ritual Tablesetting for High-Rise Dwellers

Arumjigi therefore presents new forms of ritual equipment as part of its effort to harmonize tradition with the contemporary lifestyle and its most common site of manifestation – the high-rise apartment. The designs are geared toward practicality; the tablesetting, dishes, and the screen serve as spatial coordinators, ensuring that every component would be fit into ordinary life. Also, the exhibit aims to instantiate contemporary aesthetics within the thematic trajectory of the exhibition: namely, designing new tablesetting schemes for high-rise dwellers. Furniture designer General Gray, ceramic artist Lee Ki Wook, and Arumjigi Design Team came together to lead the initiative. General Gray’s design creatively appropriates the traditional folding table form, using it as the substructure to support the upper plate of the table. In collaboration with General Gray, Lee Ki Wook devised practical designs for the dishes and other equipment set out on the table, applying a modular scheme to combine wooden heels and white porcelain dishes. Produced in modular block format, the heels offer adjustable height options for the ceremonial equipment. The metal frame and fabric-based screen, proposed by Arumjigi Design Team, is light and practical compared to the traditional screen. Whereas the customary eight-fold screens are hard to store and transport due to their sheer size and mass, the new screen can be easily moved and set up, its design also fits for use in regular interior design schemes.