MILAN (AP) -- La Scala’s 2016-17 season is a lot about healing old wounds.　It opens with a once-contested version of Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly” and continues with the long-awaited return of its former musical director who left abruptly in 2005 amid open hostility from opera house employees.　The program for the storied opera house announced Wednesday emphasizes the Italian repertoire to match the vision of principal conductor Riccardo Chailly, who will become musical director in January.　Nine o

PerformanceMay 19, 2016

A classic Korean film depicting poverty in the aftermath of the Korean War has been digitally restored for the first time.　The restored version of  “O Bal Tan (The Aimless Bullet)” was screened for the press on Thursday as part of the opening event for the Paju Conservation Center, a center established by the Korean Film Archive for the preservation and restoration of old films. A still from a digitally restored version of the 1961 film “O Bal Tan (The Aimless Bullet),” directed by Yu Hyun-mok (

FilmMay 19, 2016

SEOGWIPO, Jejudo Island --The sundrenched southern Jejudo Island is known for its seafood plucked from the seabed by women divers and served up fresh and raw at beachside eateries. 　Yet, for visitors from the mainland, local food can be challenging to the palate. Slices of raw fish in cold soup is not to everyone’s liking and some food is just too bland for taste buds used to stronger seasonings.　This difference in tastes is not lost on Kim Ji-soon, founder of the Institute for Preservation of J

FoodMay 19, 2016

Yeol, the Korean Heritage Preservation Society, will hold the 2016 Young Designers Market on May 28, the group announced Wednesday.　Launched in 2013, the event promotes quality craftworks at reasonable prices. Young designers, craftsmen and indie brands present their unique products and interact with customers.  Poster of Yeol 2016 Young Designers Market (Yeol)　This year, 16 designers and brands will take part, including Soseng Industrial Corporation, Via K Studio and handcrafted interior design

CultureMay 19, 2016

JEONJU, North Jeolla Province -- Director Andrew Ahn came to Korea to spark a conversation. 　His film, “Spa Night,” depicts David, a second-generation Korean-American working with his parents at their Korean restaurant. When the restaurant closes, David surreptitiously works at a Korean spa -- instead of studying to enter university -- to help the family. There he notices for the first time the spa’s role in secretive homosexual hookups, just as he begins considering his own identity.　“I hope th

FilmMay 19, 2016

A Night Doggaebi Market celebrating the month of May will open at Cheonggyecheon Square near Seoul City Hall from Friday to Monday between 6 p.m. and 11 p.m.“Doggaebi” is a Korean word for a type of local goblin that comes out to play tricks on people at nighttime. The city government said this mythical creature suited the nature of the night market, which only comes to life in the night and disappears by morning. Visit http://love.seoul.go.kr/ for more information on cultural events in Seoul. (

CultureMay 19, 2016

Seoul Shakespeare Company will be staging the bard’s comedy “Much Ado About Nothing” from this weekend.The play, a blend of silly humor with ideas about honor, shame and politics, is a turnaround from last year’s production of the dark and brooding “Titus Andronicus,” something director Michael Downey says was a deliberate decision."We like to change things from year to year. But I think this production is also completely different from all our previous ones,” he said, pointing out that they had

Expat LivingMay 18, 2016

From lips sewn shut to lonely roads, the imagery in the exhibition “A Place Called Home” is stark.Busan artists group Exotic Beasts will be holding the exhibition, themed on “home,” to highlight refugee issues and raise money for a local support center.“There’s a concept of home that people have. There’s an expat community (here) and for them, it’s always going to be where they come from,” said exhibition organizer Niall Ruddy “But there’s an estimated 60 million people that don’t have a home.”T

Expat LivingMay 18, 2016

The Washington State University Madrigal singers and Concert Choir held a choral exchange concert Sunday with local music group Camarata Music Company.The U.S. Choir is in Korea as part of a performance tour of Washington and South Korea and contacted the local group, performing at the Chung-dong First Methodist Church in central Seoul.Washington State University professor Lori West conducts the WSU Concert Choir at Chungdong First Methodist Church on Sunday. (Paul Kerry/The Korea Herald)The con

Expat LivingMay 18, 2016

While novelist Han Kang’s Man Booker International Prize will likely be a much-desired boost for Korean literature’s push into the international stage, there has been a prolonged, if niche, interest in Korean literature from global audiences long before her novel “The Vegetarian” came into the spotlight. 　In fact, Korean literature has enjoyed sporadic success overseas, which may have culminated in Han’s win. In Germany, for example, Jeong Yu-jeong’s “Seven Years of Darkness” ranked in the Top 1

BooksMay 18, 2016

Pil-dong, a small district filled with apartments and printing shops on the northwestern edge of Mount Namsan, is offering a variety of arts and cultural events from Thursday to Saturday. 　The advertisement agency Hands BTL which is headquartered in Pil-dong, and residents of the historic neighborhood are holding a street arts festival for the first time in the backstreets of Pil-dong, behind the bustling Chungmuro Station in Jung-gu, Seoul.  A street museum at a corner in an alley of Pil-dong (

PerformanceMay 18, 2016