Under the covers: Image and imagination in Korean popular music albums

Abstract

Although in-depth research on the topic is relatively rare, music and musical performances should not only be considered to be aural phenomena, but visual ones as well. This paper investigates one specific form of visuality and what can be learned about Korean culture by observing and analyzing album covers of popular female performers from the 1920s to the 1960s, including photographs, art work, and portraiture of the singers. Conclusions can be drawn about the changing society of the time, and the role that music- or more specifically musicians, producers, and the record companies who created the albums and album jackets-played in helping to solidify the notion of modernity in Korea in the first half of the twentieth century and the inextricable position of women in striking a balance between tradition and modernity. © 2015 Asian Center for Women's Studies, Ewha Womans University.