Lifestyle - The Korea Times

Clubs, Traditional & Art Exhibitions

Clubs Club Eden Yeoksam-dong Even the most popular clubs in Seoul are bound to go out of style after a few seasons, but Eden remains a hot spot for chic partygoers with its state-of-the-art sound system and laser light shows, and, moreover, strong lineup of globetrotting DJs creating the wildest music. The luxurious interior design befits its location at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Seoul. Call (02) 6447-0042 or visit www.eden-club.co.kr. Platoon Kunsthalle Apgujeong-dong Platoon Kunsthalle, found in Berlin, Seoul and Gwangju, is an eclectic cultural space where visitors can enjoy various facilities, including an event hall, library lounge, art studios and a bar and restaurant. Open from Monday to Saturday from 11 a.m. to 12 a.m. DJ nights on Thursdays and Fridays from 10 p.m. Located near exit 10 of Hakdong Station on subway line 7. Visit www.kunsthalle.com or www.platoon.org. Underlounge Seoul Hongdae or Hongik University Area This is the local club of a hip Japanese chain that’s also to be found in Shanghai. Located in the famous clubbing area, Hongdae,

Dec 2, 2010

Concerts, Museums & Theater

Classical Concerts Young Song Cello Recital Concert Hall, Seoul Arts Center* (See venues on left for more information) Dec. 5 Popular young cellist Young Song (Song Young-hoon) brings his most ambitious project, a recital tour showcasing hallmarks in the cello repertoire including “Elegie in C minor, Op. 24” by Faure, “Cello Sonata Nos. 1 and 2” by Brahms and “Vocalise, Op. 34, No. 14” by Rachmaninov. Pianist Aviram Reichert will accompany the artist. Tickets cost 30,000 to 70,000 won. For more information, call (02) 2658-3546. Bolshoi Opera Theater Gala Concert Concert Hall, Seoul Art Center* Dec. 16 Soloists of the Bolshoi Opera Theater will hold a gala concert in Korea to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Korea-Russia relations. Under the direction of conductor Mikhail Granovsky, soprano Anna Aglatova, mezzo-soprano Svetlana Shilova, tenor Oleg Kulko and baritone Andrei Grigoriev will sing arias from “Rigoletto,” “Carmen,” “La Traviata” and “The Queen of Spades” among others. Tickets cost 30,000 to 120,000 won. For more information, call (02) 2650-7481~2. Opera

Dec 2, 2010

Homegrown opera Love Letter premieres tonight

By Lee Hyo-won Finally, fans can enjoy a three-act opera featuring poetic, and at times comical, libretto in Korean, and moreover, themes that thoroughly resonate with the local audience. ``Love Letter’’ was born out of Seoul City’s initiative to launch a marketable homegrown opera, and it will finally be unveiled Wednesday evening at the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts, Jongno. As much as the opera was sponsored by the metropolitan government, the piece showcases the many faces of the city through a love triangle that is reincarnated over three different generations. The first act takes the audience a few centuries back to the Joseon Kingdom (1392-1910), when the capital was called Hanyang, to Gyeongseong, as the city was called at the turn of the 20th century through the colonial period (1910-45), and finally, present-day Seoul. A rehearsal session open to the press Monday revealed the spectacular set design, conjuring to life a colorful market scene of the Joseon era. The first act is a visual feast, with street musicians performing mask dances and a beautiful e

Nov 30, 2010

A mosaic of Eurasian cultures

Exhibition fetes 20 years of Korea-Russia ties By Lee Hyo-won At a glance, 19th-century “Menkva” figurines, native to the Khanty tribe in western Siberia, look just like Korean “jangseung” — traditional wooden village guardians that act like scarecrows of sorts against evil spirits. Russia, for Koreans, is often perceived as a geographically close yet distant place, but a current exhibition in Seoul shows just how deep cultural ties actually are between the Eurasian neighbors. “Path Toward: The Cultural Unity of the Peoples of Eurasia” is ongoing through March next year at the National Folk Museum of Korea in Seoul. Featuring over 600 Eurasian and Korean artifacts on loan from the Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology in St. Petersburg, the event comes in time for the 20th anniversary of bilateral ties between Korea and Russia. Visitors of the museum will be surprised to see how relics from the Russian ethnographical museum show the meeting points of different Eurasian cultures. The northernmost Yakut people, for example, eat raw horse meat like the natives of Jej

Nov 29, 2010

Clubs, Traditional & Art Exhibitions

Clubs Club Eden Yeoksam-dong Even the most popular clubs in Seoul are bound to go out of style after a few seasons, but Eden remains a hot spot for chic partygoers with its state-of-the-art sound system and laser light shows, and, moreover, strong lineup of globetrotting DJs creating the wildest music. The luxurious interior design befits its location at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Seoul. Call (02) 6447-0042 or visit www.eden-club.co.kr. Platoon Kunsthalle Apgujeong-dong Platoon Kunsthalle, found in Berlin, Seoul and Gwangju, is an eclectic cultural space where visitors can enjoy various facilities, including an event hall, library lounge, art studios and a bar and restaurant. Open from Monday to Saturday from 11 a.m. to 12 a.m. DJ nights on Thursdays and Fridays from 10 p.m. Located near exit 10 of Hakdong Station on subway line 7. Visit www.kunsthalle.com or www.platoon.org. Underlounge Seoul Hongdae or Hongik University Area This is the local club of a hip Japanese chain that’s also to be found in Shanghai. Located in the famous clubbing

Nov 25, 2010

Concerts, Museums & Theater

Classical Concerts Ji Yong Piano Recital ‘Lisztomania’ Concert Hall, Seoul Arts Center* (See venues on right for more information) Nov. 28 Pianist Ji Yong, known as a member of Ditto and for pursuing collaborative projects with prima ballerina Kang Sue-jin, will hold recital for his debut album “Lisztomania.” The program features Schumann’s “Mythen, Op. 25, No. 1 ‘Widmung,’” “Erlkonig” and other transcriptions and masterpieces by Liszt. Tickets cost 30,000 to 50,000 won. Visit www.clubbalcony.com. Young Song Cello Recital Concert Hall, Seoul Arts Center* Dec. 5 Popular young cellist Young Song (Song Young-hoon) brings his most ambitious project, a recital tour showcasing hallmarks in the cello repertoire including “Elegie in C minor, Op. 24” by Faure, “Cello Sonata Nos. 1 and 2” by Brahms and “Vocalise, Op. 34, No. 14” by Rachmaninov. Pianist Aviram Reichert will accompany the artist. Tickets cost 30,000 to 70,000 won. For more information, call (02) 2658-3546. Kim Sun-wook Piano Recital Concert Hall, Seoul Arts Center* Nov. 27 Piano prodigy Kim Sun-wook

Nov 25, 2010

Rare offering of Middle Eastern art in Seoul

By Han Sang-hee Local art buffs will be able to explore a rare exhibition of artworks from the Middle East in Seoul this week. The 21 Century International Creative Artists Association (21C ICAA) is holding the 18th Seoul International Art Festival KOREA-MIDEAST 2010 under the theme “Peace.” “The exhibition aims to compare and learn the diverse culture and art through global exchanges. We also hope to reach love and peace through the art work of numerous artists around the world,” the 21C ICAA said in a press release. Artists from 17 countries will participate in the event, including Oman, Pakistan, Turkey, Jordan, Algeria and Korea. Korea will have the most participants, 50 in total, and share their interests and distinctive tastes in art with fellow artists. The association will also hold a forum called “Art for Peace 2010” inviting artists and experts to discuss about art, peace and what artists can do in order to make the world a more colorful and peaceful place. The head of the association, Lee Bo-suk, has been in the forefront of bringing Korean art t

Nov 24, 2010

Pan-Asian dance troupe to be launched

By Lee Hyo-won The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with 17 other countries to launch a pan-Asian dance troupe, Tuesday in Seoul. The agreement was the culminating highlight of the 2010 Asian Dance Symposium, organized by the ministry’s Hub City of Asian Culture Project (HCAC), an initiative to turn Gwangju into a meeting point for artists from near and far. Representatives of 14 countries ― Korea, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam ― took part in the symposium. A second meeting is slated to take place in June 2011, for the purpose of forming the Asian Dance Committee (working title). Representatives of India, the Maldives, Nepal and Pakistan, who were absent from the Tuesday event, will be requested to attend the upcoming meeting. The committee will be comprised of 37 members ― two (one dance expert and one government official) from each of the 18 Asian countries. The batch will include member states of ASEAN (Associatio

Nov 24, 2010

Two Koreas can unite via dance: UNESCO official

By Lee Hyo-won Amid news of cross-border shelling on the Korean Peninsula, a United Nations official insists that the two Koreas could reunite through the art of dance. “My dream is to unify Korea through dance first — what the politicians can’t do, we can do. I know you’re smiling but I’m dead serious,” Alkis Faftis, president of UNESCO’s International Dance Council (CID), told reporters in Seoul, Wednesday. Faftis expressed confidence in his dream — CID has in the past brought together dancers from formerly divided parts of Yugoslavia right after the war, and also united those from areas of conflict in Cyprus and from different religious backgrounds in Israel. While CID has many members throughout Asia, it only has two headquarters in the region, and curiously enough, both of them are located on the Korean Peninsula — one in Seoul and the other in Pyongyang. It seems North Korea is not completely a “hermit kingdom” when it comes to dance — the Pyongyang branch is rather reserved in offering news about the local arts scene, said Faftis, but it

Nov 24, 2010

Bloody opera Lulu to make debut in Korea

By Lee Hyo-won She seduces, she kills and ends up becoming a prostitute before being murdered by Jack the Ripper. It’s bloody and brutal, and harrowingly so — it’s none other than Alan Berg’s opera about a murderous femme fatale, “Lulu,” which will see its Korean premiere Thursday at Seoul Arts Center. The opera is based on two of Frank Wedekind’s turn of the 20th-century plays, “Earth Spirit” and “Pandora’s Box,” for which the German dramatist was sued for obscenity. Decades have passed since “Lulu’s” 1937 premiere, but the Korea National Opera (KNO) still expects the piece to stir up the audience. “We’re finally able to present the opera in Korea. Until now it was impossible because there was no soprano capable of pulling off the role of Lulu, and it was too difficult to musically express the characters in an organic way,” Lee So-young, director of KNO, told reporters last week in Seoul. The opera is about the young, beautiful Lulu’s rise up the social ladder by marrying — and killing — one man after another (her string of bloody ties even includes a l

Nov 23, 2010

Arts & Theater

Arts & Theater

Clubs, Traditional & Art Exhibitions

Concerts, Museums & Theater

Homegrown opera Love Letter premieres tonight

A mosaic of Eurasian cultures

Clubs, Traditional & Art Exhibitions

Concerts, Museums & Theater

Rare offering of Middle Eastern art in Seoul

Pan-Asian dance troupe to be launched

Two Koreas can unite via dance: UNESCO official

Bloody opera Lulu to make debut in Korea

Most Read in Lifestyle