A special exhibition, “Monochrome Monologue,” launched May 9, 2019, at the Korean Cultural Center in Tokyo, Japan, to celebrate the center’s 40th anniversary. (Yonhap)
TOKYO, May 9 (Korea Bizwire) — The Korean Cultural Center in Japan launched a special exhibition featuring traditional Korean handicrafts on Thursday to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the institution that links the two neighboring countries.
The exhibition, titled “Monochrome Monologue,” is set to be open to the public from Friday to June 11 at Gallery MI on the first floor of the center’s building in Tokyo.
On display in the exhibit directed by South Korean fashion designer Jung Ku-ho are 75 traditional Korean art objects, recreated and reinterpreted in a modern style.
The handicrafts artfully weave contemporary craftsmanship into traditional Korean handiwork in black and white, evoking the monochrome palette of ink-and-wash paintings.
Some 100 government officials, artists and citizens from both countries attended the exhibition’s opening ceremony.
During the ceremony, Kim Tae-hoon, the head of the Korean Culture and Information Service, which manages Korean Cultural Centers worldwide, expressed hopes that the two countries would further expand their cultural exchanges to increase their mutual understanding.
“The Korean Cultural Center in Japan, established by South Korea as the first-ever overseas Korean cultural center, has a great deal of meaning, and South Korea’s choice of Japan as the starting point for its cultural communication worldwide shows that Japan is the most valued cultural partner and collaborator to Korea,” Kim noted.
“The center plans to help lift Japanese people’s understanding of Korean culture by introducing the essence of high-brow Korean culture to them,” Hwang Seong-woon, the head of the Korean Cultural Center in Japan, said during the ceremony.
Ryohei Miyata, Japanese commissioner for cultural affairs, said that the countries are sister nations whose cultural exchanges go back 1,000 years.
“So Korea and China underlie today’s Japanese culture. … Regardless of any political dimensions, Korea and Japan have really long been like brothers,” he said, stressing that they should further cement their relations through human exchanges.
Established in May 1979 as South Korea’s first overseas body to promote Korean culture, the center initiated today’s global network of 32 state-run centers in 27 foreign countries, including the United States, France, Vietnam and Argentina.
The Tokyo center has offered Korean language classes as well as exhibitions and performing arts featuring Korean cultural heritage, serving as a major channel of cultural exchange between the two neighboring countries.
As the Korean Wave, or the phenomenon of the overseas popularity of Korean pop culture, hit Japan in the early 2000s, the facility grew in size and reputation, relocating from Tokyo’s Toshima district to the more bustling Shinjuku in 2009.
(Yonhap)
Korean Cultural Center in Tokyo, Japan. (Yonhap)
