선비들은 원림을 조성하거나 경치 좋은 곳에 정자, 누를 지어 그 자연을 삶의 공간으로 적극 끌어들였는가 하면 산수화를 통해 이상적인 자연을 구현하고 완상하며 즐겼다. 원림은 자연을 인위적으로 조성한 것이자 산수화 속의 자연을 실현한 것이기도 하다. 선비들은 탈속적인 정신경계를 체현할 수 있는 은일태도를 강조했는데 자신들의 이러한 생활태도를 어느 정도 견지할 수 있는 곳이 바로 원림이라고 생각했기에 그에 적합한 공간구성을 꾀했다. 그 안에서 자연을 관조하고 깨닫고 즐겼다. 산수화 안에도 반드시 작은 집이 있고 그 안에 사람이 있어 그가 자연을 보고 있음을, 자연과 독대하고 있음을 보여준다. 그들이 그토록 자연을 대면했던 필연적인 이유가 있었을 것이다. 그림 속의 선비, 고사(高士)는 자연을 바라보며 자연의 순환과 이치를 새삼 깨닫고 있다. 마음과 정신을 맑게 하는 것, 그리고 그런 수행의 행위를 보여 주고 있는 것이다. 산수화가 보여주는 자연 속 작은 집, 정자나 누 등에 은거하고 있는 작은 인물들은 독서 중이거나 자연을 완상하고 있다. 그곳은 일종의 유토피아이자 선비가 공부하는 곳, 자연을 관조하고 심신을 수양하는 장소이다. 아울러 그곳은 적극적인 심미적 공간이기도 했다 실제 자연에서 그런 완상이 어려우면 산수화를 벽에 걸어놓고 완상하였다. 자신의 몸은 비록 세속 세상에 있지만 언젠가는 자연으로 돌아가 소요하면서 마음과 정신을 비우고 자연의 덕목을 닮고자 한 것이 우리네 선조들의 욕망이었다. 그것은 한편으로는 주어진 환경, 자연의 엄정한 구조망 속에서 서로 유기적으로 얽혀 있는 삶 안에, 자신의 몫으로 은일하는 이의 삶이 무엇일까라는 문제의식 같은 것이었다. 자연 앞에서 인간은 결과적으로 투명한 외로움과 목숨 가진 유한한 존재들이 피할 수 없는 본질적인 서글픔 같은 것을 만난다. 거대한 영원 앞에서 찰나적인 생을 살다 소멸될 운명에 처한 이들의 꿈같은 삶이 그런 것이리라. 자연과 교감하고 자연을 바라보며 자연과 자신이 유기적 연관을 갖고 있다는 사실을 깨닫는 일, 자연의 무한 영역에 자신을, 주체의 감각과 사고를 열어두는 일이었다. 그것은 인간이 절대적 주체의 자리임을 확인하는 것이 아니라 `무한성의 타자성` 에 참여하는 것이며 동시에 `지금 여기 살아있음`을 깨닫는 일이었다, 그것이 정자나 누에서 이루어졌고 산수화에서 가능했으며 무엇보다도 산수화 안에 자리한 작은 집에서 이루어졌던 것이다. 따라서 산수화 속의 작은 집은 단순한 집이나 건축공간에 머물지 않는다. 전통 산수화는 당대인의 구체적인 삶의 공간을 이해하려는 적극적인 인식행위였다 그림 안에 그들이 꿈꾸었던, 바람직한 삶의 유토피아를 가설해 보는 일이었다. 그렇다면 새삼 그 산수화가 오늘날 우리에게 어떻게 새롭게 독해될 수 있느냐는 중요한 문제다 무엇이나 초고속으로 치닫는 이 소비와 욕망이 비등한 시대에 산수화는 현실세계를 사는 우리들에게 전해주는 나름의 메시지가 분명 있을 것이다. 그 작은 집이 전해주는 절실한 메시지가 있을 것이다.

Scholars of Korea not only did involve nature enthusiastically by building their own houses, pavilions, and gazebos but also enjoyed materializing and completing their view of ideal nature through landscapes. In those landscapes, the presence of small house and a man in it is always felt and that shows the man is watching and privately encountering the nature. And there must be an inevitable reason for the encounter. If the fact that Western painting raised their beliefs to own and dominate the Outside World by reviving it caused maximization of desire to own, so-called "anthropocentric" desire to conquer the nature, Asia did not have this kind of desire to revive at all. It is at this point, the post-modernism of Eastern paintings can be sighted. The scholar in the painting, Noble Scholar is realizing the circulation and truthful logic of the nature by watching it. It is showing an act that clears the mind and soul. The little beings, who are dwelling in small houses, pavilions etc, drawn on landscapes are either reading or observing the nature. Those houses and pavilions are both a kind of Utopia, a place where scholars study, and a place where they can observe the nature and meditate and also is an enthusiastic esthetic place. It was our scholars desire to learn from the virtue of mother nature by going back to Nature and spend time there to clear mind and soul through hanging landscapes on the wall and appreciating them although the body of oneself is the secular World. That was, on the other hand, kind of like a critical mind set that asks "what life is it for a man who secretly live in his share in a life that is tangled organically in given environment and a net that was regulated by Nature. Human being resultingly face transparent loneliness and essential sadness that finite things that has life can`t escape from. Dreamy life for people facing the destiny to fade in front of the enormous eternity after living a short life would be like that. Realizing the fact that Nature and one self shares an organic relationship by watching and communing with Nature was opening a door of thoughts and senses on the infinite territory of Nature. That, by the way, was not to verify that human beings are in a position with absolute control, but to participate in `otherness of infinity` and to realize the fact that `we are live here` Traditional landscape was an enthusiastic cognitive act to understand the specific space of life of people of that era. It was an act to hypothesize desirable life of Utopia that they dreamed of. With that being said, it is an important task for us to find out how that same landscape can be freshly read to us living the present. Landscape, in the generation of seething desire and rapid consumption, must have a message in its own way towards us who are living the present World.Scholars of Korea not only did involve nature enthusiastically by building their own houses, pavilions, and gazebos but also enjoyed materializing and completing their view of ideal nature through landscapes. In those landscapes, the presence of small house and a man in it is always felt and that shows the man is watching and privately encountering the nature. And there must be an inevitable reason for the encounter. If the fact that Western painting raised their beliefs to own and dominate the Outside World by reviving it caused maximization of desire to own, so-called "anthropocentric" desire to conquer the nature, Asia did not have this kind of desire to revive at all. It is at this point, the post-modernism of Eastern paintings can be sighted. The scholar in the painting, Noble Scholar is realizing the circulation and truthful logic of the nature by watching it. It is showing an act that clears the mind and soul. The little beings, who are dwelling in small houses, pavilions etc, drawn on landscapes are either reading or observing the nature. Those houses and pavilions are both a kind of Utopia, a place where scholars study, and a place where they can observe the nature and meditate and also is an enthusiastic esthetic place. It was our scholars desire to learn from the virtue of mother nature by going back to Nature and spend time there to clear mind and soul through hanging landscapes on the wall and appreciating them although the body of oneself is the secular World. That was, on the other hand, kind of like a critical mind set that asks "what life is it for a man who secretly live in his share in a life that is tangled organically in given environment and a net that was regulated by Nature. Human being resultingly face transparent loneliness and essential sadness that finite things that has life can`t escape from. Dreamy life for people facing the destiny to fade in front of the enormous eternity after living a short life would be like that. Realizing the fact that Nature and one self shares an organic relationship by watching and communing with Nature was opening a door of thoughts and senses on the infinite territory of Nature. That, by the way, was not to verify that human beings are in a position with absolute control, but to participate in `otherness of infinity` and to realize the fact that `we are live here` Traditional landscape was an enthusiastic cognitive act to understand the specific space of life of people of that era. It was an act to hypothesize desirable life of Utopia that they dreamed of. With that being said, it is an important task for us to find out how that same landscape can be freshly read to us living the present. Landscape, in the generation of seething desire and rapid consumption, must have a message in its own way towards us who are living the present World.