Celadon Double-Walled Openwork Vase: Ten Symbols of Longevity Motif

This vase is not merely adorned with auspicious imagery; it constructs an entire cosmology of longevity through structure, symbolism, and restraint.

“Here, longevity is not a motif placed upon the surface—it is a world made permeable through light, air, and time.”

Created in 2022 by Young-soo Kim, an Icheon master ceramic artisan, this work is a commanding example of the double-walled openwork technique, one of the most technically exacting practices in contemporary Korean celadon. The process begins with the making of two separate vessels: an inner jar that secures the structure, and a finely worked outer shell that is cut open along a seam, fitted around the inner body, then rejoined before being pierced and carved. The complexity of this method lies not only in the difficulty of construction, but in the fact that every incision removes support. Precision, therefore, is inseparable from risk.

Kim’s mastery is especially evident in the vase’s nearly spherical form, whose calm fullness becomes the ground for an extraordinarily intricate openwork field. The outer skin does not function merely as ornament. It acts as a permeable membrane through which the inner vessel is only partially revealed, producing a shifting interplay of concealment and disclosure. The viewer is invited to look both at the surface and through it, to experience the vase not as a flat decorative object but as a layered spatial presence.

Within this pierced surface unfolds the imagery of the Ten Symbols of Longevity: sun, clouds, mountains, water, pine, bamboo, the herb of immortality, crane, turtle, and deer. These motifs are deeply embedded in Korean visual culture, where they signify enduring life, spiritual resilience, purity, and natural continuity. On this vase, they are not treated as a simple symbolic checklist. Instead, they interweave to form a continuous landscape of auspicious existence. The imagery circles the vessel as though time itself were unbroken.

Particularly compelling is the restrained introduction of red accents, visible in the sun and in the head of the crane. These chromatic interventions are minimal, yet they carry enormous visual and symbolic force. Against the vase’s cool celadon body, the red reads almost like a pulse—an animating presence within the otherwise meditative stillness of the piece. It creates a subtle tension between serenity and vitality, between permanence and living energy.

The lower register of the vase, where stylized waves gather, grounds the composition in flowing movement, while the upper areas open into clouds and celestial space. Bamboo and pine introduce the language of steadfastness; crane, deer, and turtle articulate longevity through living form. The work thus stages a complete symbolic ecology, one in which heaven, earth, plant life, and animal life are held in equilibrium.

The artist’s own reflections on double-walled openwork illuminate the achievement of the piece. He notes that the process requires not only the making of the primary body, but also a second inner vessel, attached with a precise interval of space between them. The treatment of the surface must be exact, or the glaze will not settle properly; the danger of failure remains constant. Larger works may require over a year of labor, with drying alone lasting up to six months. Such statements are not incidental—they remind us that the serenity of the finished vase is inseparable from the endurance demanded by its making.

This work is therefore best understood not simply as a celadon vessel, but as a meditation on survival—of form, of tradition, and of meaning. Through openwork, Kim turns clay into an environment of breath and light; through the Ten Symbols of Longevity, he transforms that environment into a quiet but expansive vision of life’s continuity. The vase does not merely represent longevity. It embodies the patience required to make it visible.

Dimensions

• Height- 40 cm (15.75 inch)
• Diameter- 38 cm (14.96 inch)