The Wind Rises (風立ちぬ) now at Southside Works.

The latest Hayao Miyazaki film The Wind Rises (風立ちぬ) is currently playing at Pittsburgh's SouthSide Works Cinema (map). From a TIME magazine review last month:

The Wind Rises — its title taken from a line in Paul Valéry’s poem “The Graveyard by the Sea” (“The wind is rising! We must try to live!”) — weaves a tender, doomed love story into two volcanic decades of Japan’s history, from 1918 to the end of the ’30s. Here are indelible images of the 1923 Kanto earthquake and the firestorms that devoured whole cities and killed 140,000 people. Here is the Depression that crippled Japan while its government poured more money into its military.

The movie is really a double biopic: of Horikoshi, whose life it follows from his youth to his work at Mitsubishi, with a brief postwar coda; and of the author Tatsuo Hori, whose 1937 novel The Wind Has Risen tells the story of a tubercular girl at a sanatorium. The life and works of Hori, who died of TB in 1953 at age 48, inform the character of Naoko Satomi, the young woman who becomes Jiro’s wife.

The version currently playing in Pittsburgh, and the one released nationwide on February 28, is dubbed in English. Showtimes for March 4, 5, and 6 are 1:40 pm, 4:30 pm, 7:20 pm, and 10:10 pm.

Again with the memes, at Tân Lạc Viên Vietnamese Bistro on Murray Ave.

Ran (乱), Castaway on the Moon (김씨 표류기), Yi Yi (一一) comprise Maridon Museum's Spring Film Series.

Butler's Maridon Museum announced its 2014 Spring Film Series today, which will be comprised of the Japanese film Ran on March 20, the South Korean film Castaway on the Moon on April 24, and the Taiwanese film Yi Yi on May 15. More-detailed posts on each will follow closer to the dates.

The Maridon Museum of Asian Art is located at 322 N. McKean St. in downtown Butler, some 40 miles north of Pittsburgh (map). It holds film series throughout the year, with recent themes of relevance to this blog being Vietnamese and Taiwanese films.

Wong Kar Wai's The Grandmaster (一代宗師) at Erie Art Museum, March 5.

Wong Kar Wai's latest film The Grandmaster (一代宗師), which opened throughout the US in August 2013, will play at the Erie Art Museum (map) on March 5. Starring Tony Leung and Zhang Ziyi, the New York Times wrote last year it's

a hypnotically beautiful dream from the Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar-wai, opens with curls of smoke, eddies of water and men soaring and flying across the frame as effortlessly as silk ribbons. The men are warriors, street fighters with furious fists and winged feet, who have massed together on a dark, rainy night to take on Ip Man (Tony Leung), a still figure in a long coat and an elegant white hat. Even amid the violent whirlpools of rain and bodies, that hat never leaves his head. It’s as unyielding as its owner.

The movie starts at 7:00. Tickets are $5 at the door, or $6.17 online.

Oakland's Sushi Boat cited, temporarily closd by Allegheny County Health Department.

The Pitt News wrote on Wednesday that Sushi Boat Asian Food on Oakland Ave. was cited by the Allegheny County Health Department on February 18 "for numerous critical violations of the county’s Food Safety Rules and Regulations."

"Still Watching a Movie?: Korean National Cinema in the Post-Film Era" lecture at Pitt, March 3.

Korean Popular Culture Reader, 2014.

The University of Pittsburgh's Film Studies program will host Dr. Kyung Hyun Kim and his lecture "Still Watching a Movie?: Korean National Cinema in the Post-Film Era" on Monday, March 3, in room 501 of the Cathedral of Learning (map). Dr. Kim is a professor at the University of California Irvine, author on numerous articles and books on Korean film and pop culture, and editor of the forthcoming The Korean Popular Culture Reader. The talk runs from 1 to 3 pm and is free.

On a related topic at Pitt on the same day, Ph.D. candidate Seung-hwan Shin in the Department of English will defend his dissertation "New Korean Cinema: Mourning to Regeneration" at 9:30 am in the same room, 501 Cathedral of Learning.

Pitt alumnus named chancellor of Baekseok Culture University.

Young Shik Kim (김영식) was named the 7th chancellor of Baekseok Culture University (백석문화대학교) on February 19. Kim, 63, earned a Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh in 2000 in Administrative and Policy Studies / Higher Education Management. His dissertation is titled The Higher Educational Policy-Making Process in Korea: A Case Study for the National Policy of University Autonomy (1986-1990).


From the 2001 University of Pittsburgh commencement program, via Documenting Pitt.

Dinh Q. Lê lecture at CMU School of Art on March 4, discussion at Carnegie Museum of Art on March 5.

Dinh Q. Lê, from the "Vietnam to Hollywood" series, via Blendspace.

The Carnegie Mellon University School of Art will host Dinh Q. Lê on March 4 as part of its Spring 2014 Lecture Series. From the Lecture Series homepage:

Born in Vietnam during wartime in 1968, artist DINH Q LE moved to the US at 10 years old and was brought up amid Western depictions of his homeland. In his artistic practice, Lê developed an innovative multidisciplinary technique that combined traditional Vietnamese craft with images and fragments of history and modern truths. His work continued after he returned to Vietnam in his 20s, where he examined complex and contradictory topics such as the continuing legacy of the war and the marketing of Vietnam as a tourist's paradise. Lê is the co-founder of the Vietnam Foundation for the Arts, which initiates artistic exchanges between Vietnam and the West, and Sán Art, the first independent not-for-profit art space in Ho Chi Minh City. In 2010, Lê was the recipient of the Prince Claus Award. He will discuss past projects and his work for the 2013 Carnegie International.

Lê is one of several Asian artists with works on display at the 2013 Carnegie International, which runs through March 16 at the Carnegie Museum of Art (map). The day after the CMU lecture, March 5, Lê will participate in a discussion at the Carnegie Museum of Art Theater. From the museum's website:

Explore Dinh Q. Lê’s work in the 2013 Carnegie International in greater depth. Life and Belief: Sketches of Life from the Vietnam War, an installation of 100 drawings and paintings made by Vietnamese artist-soldiers on the front lines of the Vietnam War accompanied by a documentary film, will be the starting point of a discussion focused on art, war, and image. Lê, who will speak to the artists’ inside interpretation of the war, will converse with Dr. Daniel Lieberfeld, associate professor at Duquesne University, and Dr. Philip Nash, Vietnam historian and associate professor of history at Penn State Shenango, about the power of images during and after the conflict. Lê will also discuss his follow-up companion project to this piece—a look at the non-communist artists and their lasting legacy. Exhibition co-curator Dan Byers will moderate the discussion. Cosponsored by Carnegie Mellon University School of Art and Jeff Pan.

The discussion runs from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. and is free with admission to the museum.

“Spiritual Health vs. Mental Health: The Uses of Japanese Naikan Meditation” lecture at Pitt, February 27.

The Asian Studies Center at the University of Pittsburgh will host Associate Professor of Religious Studies Dr. Clark Chilson and his lecture "Spiritual Health vs. Mental Health: The Uses of Japanese Naikan Meditation" on February 27 as part of the Asia Over Lunch lecture series. It takes place at 12:00 pm in room 4130 Posvar Hall (campus map) and is free. Upcoming lectures in the series this term are printed on the flyer above.

"Japan and Its Asian Neighbors: History, Islands and National Identity” video-conference lecture at Pitt, February 25.

The second installment of the "Japan in the Broader Context of Asia" lecture series is "Japan and Its Asian Neighbors: History, Islands and National Identity”, by Dr. Constantine Vaporis, a professor in the University of Maryland Baltimore County's History department. The presentation begins at 6:00 pm, and is followed by light refreshments and a networking reception. An overview of the series from the University of Pittsburgh's Asian Studies Center newsletter:

The next lecture of the NCTA video-conference lecture series is “Japan and Its Asian Neighbors: History, Islands and National Identity,” featuring Constantine N. Vaporis, Professor of History and Director of the Asian Studies Program, University of Maryland. A light dinner will be served for all participants starting at 5:30

This lecture is part of a series of an NCTA video-conference lectures “Japan in the Broader Context of Asia,” which will feature a variety of talks by professors from Pitt, Elizabethtown College, and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

These lectures are free, but space is limited and registration is required by emailing Patrick Hughes at hughespw@pitt.edu (please let him know which lectures you wish to attend). You may register for as many of the sessions as you like.