Congratulations to the Korean Englishman team Josh Carrott and Ollie Kendal for their “Korea Image Stepping Stone Bridge Award” from the Corea Image Communication Institute (CICI). The award ceremony was held two days ago. Josh and Ollie run the 영국남자 Korean Englishman and JOLLY YouTube channels, which between them have over 4 million subscribers. Links: Corea Image … [Read More]
Category: Cultural Promotion
Congratulations to the KCCUK: 10 years old today
The Korean Cultural Centre opened the doors for its launch party ten years ago today, on 30 January 2008. Jennifer Barclay, author of Meeting Mister Kim, was there to cover the event for LKL. It’s been a hectic 10 years since then: 10 film festivals 245 film screenings (not counting collateral screenings in places like … [Read More]
UK/Korea Creative Futures is launched
Here is the official announcement from the British Council of the collaboration with Korea over the next two years: British Council announces UK/KOREA Creative Futures 2017 London, 20 February 2017. The British Council today officially launched UK/KOREA Creative Futures 2017, a year-long celebration of the long-standing relationship between the UK and Korea which will see … [Read More]
Choigate and Park Geun-hye’s censorship of the arts – contd
A couple more links relating to censorship under Park Geun-hye, which will be updated as news breaks. First, a re-post of the pdf purporting to be the blacklist of 9,473 names, first posted here. 10 Jan 2017: Via Br Anthony comes the “appalling news … that [Park] personally gave orders that the two most important … [Read More]
Choigate, censorship and the arts
At any other time the presence of a demonstrator outside the KCC – and outside the opening screening of the London Korean Film Festival – protesting about artistic censorship that is said to have taken place during the current KCC director’s stint at the National Gugak Centre would have been prominent news. But choreographer Jung … [Read More]
So long, Ms Jeon, and thanks for everything
Those of you who have read your May / June KCC newsletter diligently will already know this (and those of you that haven’t can download it here): Ms Jeon has decided to move on from the KCCUK. Her last day there was 24 April. Ms Jeon has been working for the promotion of Korean culture in … [Read More]
Looking back at 2012: Culture, tourism and branding stories
The first of four articles in which we look back at some of the stories which caught our attention during the course of 2012. In this first article we look at cultural promotion, heritage, tourism and related topics. Heritage and Cultural Promotion Korea’s national folk song, Arirang, was listed as world Intangible Cultural Heritage by … [Read More]
The boom in literature museums
Those of you who saw Eungyo at the London Korean Film Festival 2012 may remember that the older author was talking with city officials about building a literature museum in his honour (and trying to avoid the honour). According to an article in today’s Joongang Ilbo, the building of literature museums has become rather a … [Read More]
No Artificial Flavour: an upcoming online gallery for Korean artists and designers
At LKL we hadn’t realised, until Hanmi Gallery drew our attention to it in December, that the vitality of the London Korean art scene had been dealt a damaging blow by the closure of the Tier 1 (Post-study work) Visa to new applicants from 6 April 2012, which pretty much means that overseas students have … [Read More]
French cultural adviser to Korean presidents slams Paris KCC
Guy Sorman, French economist and philosopher, has advised President Lee Myung-bak on cultural promotion, and has met with two previous Korean presidents. In a recent press conference reported by the Korea Times he expresses some interesting thoughts on the success of K-pop abroad: “It’s thanks to the work of artists, not the government”. And he … [Read More]
Hallyu Museum to open near Incheon Airpot
According to bridge bloggers AllKpop, who have translated a Korean article on Nate, a Hallyu Museum will be opening in the second half of 2012 near Incheon Airport to enable travellers to get a quick fix of their current bias or favourite TV actor. An interesting way of catering to the hallyu tourists. [Read More]
Presenting intangible cultural heritage in Bucheon
Monday 3 May 2010. Bucheon, a city of around 850,000 people in Gyeonggi-do just 40 minutes’ drive West from Seoul, is home of the Bucheon World Intangible Cultural Heritage Expo (BICHE), an annual event which showcases some of Korea’s finest performance arts and crafts alongside those of a dozen or so invited countries. The first … [Read More]
Presenting Korean Culture 3: Communication is key
I have now, alas, given up asking the KCC to send me monthly details of their upcoming events. They have a monthly news-sheet available at their front desk, they know I like to be emailed a copy of it as soon as it is available in draft, but it never happens. They know my communication … [Read More]
Presenting Korean Culture 2: Why bother with the artist VIPs?
Having being forced to think about issues concerning the presentation of Korean culture in London for the recent seminar at I-MYU, here are some additional thoughts, with maybe some more to come. The current exhibition at the Cultural Centre provides a stimulating and thought-provoking panorama of environmental issues. Present at the opening reception were two … [Read More]
The presentation of Korean Contemporary Art in London – a punter’s perspective
Having fumbled my incoherent, jet-lagged way through a half prepared presentation at I-MYU a couple of days ago, here, Thucydidean style, is what I would have said if I had been better prepared. Since LKL went online three and a half years ago, we’ve tracked over 90 exhibitions of Korean art and artefacts, most of … [Read More]
The KCC DVD library
I popped round to the Korean Cultural Centre a couple of weeks ago to check on how things were going. I went downstairs to register for the library, and was greeted by this encouraging sight: It’s some of the DVDs that are being catalogued and which will be available for viewing. That big box at … [Read More]