ASIA SOCIETY PRESENTS "LABYRINTH: IN THE MOON-NIGHT"

Friday and Saturday, June 28th and 29th, 2002 at 8:00 p.m.

At Asia Society and Museum
725 Park Avenue (at 70th Street)
New York City

The Asia Society and the Korean Cultural Service will co-present two performances of "In the Moon-Night," an evening of music and dance by Korea's leading contemporary creative and interpretive artists. The program of four works includes the U.S. premiere of "Labyrinth," widely considered one of the most innovative expressions of modern Korean performing arts. The evening is conceived and directed by one of Korea's foremost creative artists, the dancer/ choreographer, vocalist, and author Sin Cha Hong. She will be accompanied by composer and master kayageum (12-stringed zither) player Byung-ki Hwang, and Kang Kwon Soon, a brilliant traditional court and folk singer and contemporary interpretive vocalist.

"In the Moon-Night" brings together traditional Korean themes and sounds, the richness of contemporary Korean artistic expression, and the timeless, universal inspiration of the phases of the moon. Ms. Hong has devised the evening as a journey through four separate works that evoke the moon's varied effects on human consciousness.

"New Moon" is a new solo dance created and performed by Ms. Hong, and inspired by the moon's first fragile 'arched eyebrow' phase (called, in Korea, the 'new moon') - a hopeful phase of new beginnings. The work is further inspired by the image of women emerging from their homes in the pre-dawn twilight to pray for the fulfillment of earthly wishes, as they have done in Korea for generations. For Ms. Hong, the feeling of the half moon is that of stability and celebration.

"Half Moon" features a traditional song performed by Ms. Kang in the highly stylized technique of Korean court music.

The dramatic full moon phase is represented by "Labyrinth," Byung-ki Hwang's groundbreaking 1975 composition. This is a seven-part voyage beginning with laughter and gradually progressing in stages of wild lamentation into a kind of madness from which it emerges at last, resolving in a profoundly peaceful serenity. At the Korean premiere of "Labyrinth," Hwang's avant-garde kayageum playing and Hong's tempestuously experimental vocals created a sensation. This collaborative work is now recognized as an historic turning point in contemporary Korean creative expression.

Closing the evening is "Moonless," a new dance/theater work in which the black darkness of an overcast moonless midnight gives rise to inward reflection. This meditative piece is expressed in slow movement and stylized gestures. Ms. Hong (dance) and Ms. Kang (vocals) are accompanied by guest musicians playing the kayageum and the ching, a hand-held gong.

"New Moon" and "Moonless" were created by Ms. Hong especially for these performances. These presentations are part of Korea's worldwide cultural celebration of the 2002 FIFA World Cup™ tournament and Visit Korea Year 2002. Tickets for the performance are priced at $20 ($16 for members). Tickets may be purchased at the Asia Society Box Office at (212) 327-9276.

Major support for performance programs at the Asia Society is provided by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Additional support for the Asia Society's cultural programs is provided by the Friends of Asian Arts, Wallace - Reader's Digest Funds, The Starr Foundation, the Booth Ferris Foundation, the Hazen Polsky Foundation Inc., and the Harold J. and Ruth Newman Philanthropic Fund.

The Asia Society is America's leading institution dedicated to fostering understanding of Asia and communication between Americans and the peoples of Asia and the Pacific. A nonprofit, nonpartisan educational institution, the Asia Society presents a wide range of programs including major art exhibitions, performances, media programs, international conferences and lectures, and initiatives to improve elementary and secondary education about Asia. The Asia Society is headquartered in New York City, with regional centers in Washington, D.C., Houston, Los Angeles, Hong Kong and Melbourne, Australia, and representative offices in San Francisco, Manila and Shanghai. For more information, contact the Asia Society, 725 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10021. (212) 288-6400. (www.asiasociety.org).

Artists' Biographies

Sin Cha Hong, choreographer, dancer, vocalist, and author, was born and educated in Korea and came to New York City in the late 1960s to study and dance. She stayed for more than twenty years, founding the Laughing Stone Dance Theater Company and creating strikingly bold, minimalist short pieces and evening-length works that consistently won press and audience accolades. At the Asia Society in 1984, she performed her own new choreography for the New York premiere of John Cage's 1944 piano work, "Four Walls." In 1990, Hong brought her creative focus back to Asia, moving to a small mountain village in Korea where she founded the Juksan Arts Center. As a soloist and with her company, Ms. Hong performs throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. She is regularly invited to teach at Beijing's Central Dance Academy and she is also a Visiting Professor at the Korean National University of Arts. Hong has received numerous prestigious American awards and many of Korea's highest artistic honors, including being named one of Korea's ten most important creative artists of the 20th century. She has also been recognized as one of the most influential contemporary artists in Asia.

Byung-ki Hwang, renowned kayageum virtuoso and one of Korea's most important composers, was born in Seoul in 1936. He pursued simultaneous studies in Korean traditional music and law, winning two first prizes in the National Competition of Traditional Music before earning a law degree at Seoul National University in 1959. Dr. Hwang has performed and lectured internationally since the 1960s. He broke new ground in the development of a contemporary repertoire for ancient instruments and is widely credited as being the first musician to bridge traditional Korean folk and court styles of music. As an innovative composer, his creative sensibility is as informed by international musical trends and thought as it is rooted in traditional Korean music and philosophy. Dr. Hwang has received numerous honors including the National Music Prize (1965), the Korean Cinema Music Award (1973) and the Jungang Cultural Grand Prize (1992), among others. He is Professor Emeritus at Ewha University, serves on the Korean government's Cultural Properties Preservation Committee and, in 2000, was appointed to Korea's National Academy of Arts.

Kang Kwon Soon was born in Korea in 1969. She began her music and vocal training at an early age, mastering the rigorous techniques required for the performance of chungak (an ancient court form), kagok (a more recent lyrical form) and p'ansori (a long, dramatic storytelling folk form). A brilliant exponent of the exacting, highly stylized techniques that characterize these traditions, Ms. Kang has in recent years lent her talents to contemporary theatrical contexts as well, including "Forgiveness," a multimedia work conceived and directed by Chen Shi-Zheng, developed in collaboration with composer Eve Beglarian, and co-commissioned by the Asia Society in 2000. Ms. Kang has won prestigious musical competitions in Korea, appearing as a soloist with leading musical ensembles such as the Seoul Metropolitan Traditional Music Orchestra, and celebrations such as Buddha's Birthday at the famous Bulguk-sa temple in Kyongju. Since 1989, Ms. Kang's ever-expanding international schedule has included classical and contemporary performances in Asia, Europe, Canada, and across the United States.

The kayageum is a Korean plucked zither with moveable bridges that is closely related to the Chinese zheng. Unlike the zheng and another relative, the Japanese koto, both of which have 13 strings, the kayageum has 12 strings. The kayageum is played in Korean folk and court music forms. In performance, it is traditionally paired with the changgo, a double-headed, hourglass-shaped drum. Byung-ki Hwang's compositions sometimes detach the kayageum from that context, presenting it as a solo instrument in its own right. Furthermore, while the time-honored playing technique involves plucking the strings, Hwang's compositions for kayageum sometimes call for it to be strummed, stroked with a bow, or struck with a drumstick - all innovative techniques that plumb the kayageum's "inner voice" - as audiences will see and hear in "Labyrinth."

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