London Korean Links

Covering things Korean in London and beyond since 2006

DPRK art exhibition coming to London

With commendable forward publicity for a Korean cultural event, I hear of an exciting DPRK art exhibition coming to London in July and August this year. From 18 July to 31 August at a gallery space just off Trafalgar Square, it’s early days yet to have full details. But we know that DPRK artist Pak … [Read More]

Bae Doo-na’s London Photo Journal

Thanks to Mark Russell over at Korea Pop Wars for news of a photo journal of Bae Doo-na’s visit to London. Can any Korean speakers out there have a read of what appears to be Ms Bae’s official blog at Naver, and tell me how to get hold of the book? Update 11 April: It’s … [Read More]

Money where the mouth is

Is South Korea the only country in which there are regular press articles which highlight the amount of profits that foreigners make from the Korean market – the implication being that only Koreans should be allowed to make a profit? A recent Chosun article summarised the 2006 Central Bank investment statistics. Six months ago KBS … [Read More]

April events 2007

Arts Francesca Cho’s show continues at the East @ West Wing festival in Slough until 6 April Sora Kim continues at the Baltic space in Gateshead until 29 April (review here) Andreas Gursky’s giant photos of the Arirang Festival continue at the White Cube (review here) Roe Kyung-jo’s show From Canvas to Ceramic opens at … [Read More]

Upcoming Korea Discussion Group talk at Chatham House

Another talk has been arranged for lunchtime on 3 April, on the topic of Inside North Korea: Changes and Continuity. The speaker will be Dr Kongdan Oh. Biography, courtesy of the Korea Discussion Group: Dr. Kongdan (Katy) Oh is a Research Staff Member at the Institute for Defense Analyses and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at … [Read More]

British-owned culture cafe opens in Bucheon

Thanks to Peter Orange for letting me know about an interesting new venture in Bucheon (부천): Cafe Nicolia, run by British / Korean couple Nicholas and Lia Young. From their website, it looks like a version of Seoul Selection, but obviously with more food and, I’m guessing, fewer books. On my rare visits to Seoul … [Read More]

The Japanese counter-wave

March’s edition of Seoul magazine has an interesting article discussing how cultural waves do not travel in just one direction. Supporters of Korean culture are keen to point out the unstoppability of the hallyu: Rain in the Philippines, BoA in Japan, Super Junior in China, TV Dramas everywhere (except the UK it seems). Back home, … [Read More]

James Salter: The Hunters

Penguin 2007 (originally published 1956) A ripping yarn set among the US fighter pilots in the Korean war. Apart from the passing references to Korean houseboys, and the fact that the dogfights take place over the river Yalu, there’s nothing to distinguish this novel plot-wise from your average Commando war mag. There’s the experienced and … [Read More]

The last days of Daechuri

As a follow up to my previous post linking to Bum Lee’s project, here’s a link to a short film made by Chris and Shirley Gelken at Daechuri last weekend. Well worth a look. There’s some great written coverage and photos on their blogs. A sample of Chris’s photos is shown above. See the full … [Read More]

Seoul lags as an international financial hub

The Corporation of London has just launched a new index: the Global Financial Centres Index. It’s a way of ranking various cities that aspire to being recognised as international financial services centres. It was launched in Cannes last week at MIPIM, the international property industry boondoggle. The occasion provided the opportunity to update the City’s … [Read More]

DPRK Foreign Ministry comment on UNDP withdrawl

Just received Pyongyang, March 13 (KCNA) — The United Nations Development Program recently announced that it would suspend its country program for the DPRK and, accordingly, withdraw the staff members of its office from Pyongyang. A spokesman for the DPRK Ministry of Foreign Affairs Tuesday answered the question raised by KCNA in this regard. The … [Read More]

The Irish Contribution to Joseon Korea

Another post in honour of St Patrick: OhMyNews has a piece on the Irish contribution to Korea’s early modern history Arguably the first Irishman to live in Korea arrived in Seoul in the mid 1890s. His name was John McLeavy Brown, and he was a lawyer by trade, but was employed with the Imperial Chinese … [Read More]