"Voyage to Vietnam: Celebrating the Tet Festival" at Children's Museum of Pittsburgh, October 17.

The Children's Museum of Pittsburgh will host "Celebrating the Tet Festival" on Sunday, October 17, as the opening day in its Voyage to Vietnam exhibit.

Discover the beauty, sights, and sounds of Vietnam through the lens of Tet, the most important celebration of the year, in this interactive exhibition. Dress up in customaryAo Daiand pose for an interactive family photo. Try on a giant lion head and make and launch a fireworks display to signal the culmination of the celebration. Visitors will gain appreciation for the traditions, values, and daily experiences of people who live in Vietnam, and discover similarities and differences among the lives of children in the U.S. and in Vietnam

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The touring exhibit, currently in San Jose, will be in Pittsburgh from October 17 through January 17, 2016. The Freeman Foundation Asian Culture Exhibit Series website provides an overview:

Through the interactive experiences and programming of Voyage to Vietnam, children soak up the essence of Tết—its sights, sounds, stories, textures and experiences. Providing multiple entry points for visitors of all ages to engage personally in authentic Vietnamese culture, Voyage to Vietnam will be scalable from 924 sq.ft. to1,500 sq.ft. to accommodate venues with varying capacity. The exhibit will incorporate Vietnamese-inspired materials, color palette, and an immersive marketplace experience with elements such as bamboo, fabric, umbrellas, plank bed and scripts and fonts that evoke modern Vietnamese calligraphy. Fabrication strategies include using banners rather than painted walls; video backdrops as set-pieces, digital narratives demonstrating cultural practices, and collapsible steel “carts” for shipping the exhibit, reducing the crate storage for the exhibit’s square footage.

"Celebrating the Tet Festival" runs from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. The Children's Museum of Pittsburgh is located at 10 Children's Way on the North Side (map). Admission is $14 for adults and $13 for seniors and for children aged 2 to 18.

Documentary The Look of Silence free at Parkway Theater, October 2 and 3.

Citing poor attendance at August showings of the film, the Parkway Theater in McKees Rocks will show the 2014 documentary The Look of Silence for free on October 2 and 3. A synopsis of the documentary on the Indonesian killings of 1965 and 1966, via the film's website:

Through [director Joshua] Oppenheimer's footage of the perpetrators of the 1965 Indonesian genocide, a family of survivors discovers how their son was murdered, as well as the identities of the killers. The documentary focuses on the youngest son, an optometrist named Adi, who decides to break the suffocating spell of submission and terror by doing something unimaginable in a society where the murderers remain in power: he confronts the men who killed his brother and, while testing their eyesight, asks them to accept responsibility for their actions. This unprecedented film initiates and bears witness to the collapse of fifty years of silence.

On September 3, the theater posted on Facebook that a total of 11 people saw the film during the initial eight screenings there.

The Friday, October 2 showing will be at 7:00 pm, and the October 3rd showing at 5:45 pm. The theater is located at 644 Broadway Ave. in McKees Rocks (map), a few miles west of the North Side.

"China Town Hall: Local Collections, National Reflections" at Pitt on Chinese investments in US and in American education, October 5.

The University of Pittsburgh's Asian Studies Center will host the next "China Town Hall: Local Collections, National Reflections" on October 5. It consists of a national webcast at 7:00 pm and an in-person talk titled "An Educated Investment: How Chinese Families are Spending Big on American Education and How It Could Change Both Countries" at 8:00:

Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin is leading an expert panel for a live "town hall" meeting on what China's investments in the US mean for American workers, communities, and the economy.

Afterwards at 8 there will be a talk by Senior Writer for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Karin Fischer on Chinese families investment in their children's US education.

The session will begin at 6:45 pm in 4130 Posvar Hall (map), and is free and open to the public.

From 匹茲堡大學 Facebook page.

University of Pittsburgh officials are currently touring China. Photographed above in the Forbidden Palace in Beijing are: Asian Studies Center Director James Cook, Chancellor Patrick Gallagher, University Center for International Studies Director Ariel Armony, Confucius Institute Director Michele Heryford, and Pitt China representative Tina Zhang. The University of Pittsburgh Asian Studies Center writes:

In Beijing they held meetings with Renmin University and Beijing Normal University as well as the Ministries of Health and Education.
Currently they are heading to Chengdu to attend the inaugural matriculation ceremony for the Sichuan University-Pittsburgh Institute.

Yaeji at VIA 2015, October 3.

via Yaeji k r a e j i's Facebook page.

One of the headliners of the VIA 2015 festival is Yaeji: artist, DJ, and recent CMU graduate. From the VIA website:

Yaeji (k r a e j i) is a NY born and Seoul raised DJ/Producer/Vocalist. She started her DJ career at the WRCT88.3 station and has performed at various venues in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Seoul, and New York. Her production and vocals hold influences from R&B, jazz, dream pop, and house. Outside of her musical life, she enjoys visual art and graphic design.

She'll perform at the October 3 Main Event is at Spirit at 242 51st Street (map). Tickets are available online, and more information is on the Facebook event page.

VIA is a Pittsburgh festival in its sixth year that's received acclaim locally and nationally as

A focused and thoughtfully curated series, the VIA Festival is dedicated to presenting artists who are pushing the boundaries of their fields and introduces emerging talent to Pittsburgh while also honoring already beloved and internationally renowned acts.

Bunjinga painting program, demonstration on September 25 and 26.

The Japan-American Society of Pennsylvania shares news of two Bunjinga painting programs in the Pittsburgh area with guest artist Fujyo Kato on Friday and Saturday. On September 25, Kato and Hiromi Katayama will be at the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh from 12:00 to 3:00 pm.

Join Handa City Culture program, the Japan-America Society of Pittsburgh and the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh in welcoming guest artist, Fujyo Kato from Aichi, Japan.

Mr. Kato performed his painting at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh back in 1995 and is returning to perform his unique painting style on a large piece of paper again! Learn the art of Bunjinga painting by putting strokes of sumi ink on the paper as Mr. Kato incorporates them into one large inspirational spontaneous painting.

Also joining us is past F.I.N.E. Art Resident, Hiromi Katayama, whom you can paint alongside with and learn traditional Japanese painting techniques!

The museum is located at 10 Children's Way on the North Side (map). Admission is $14 for adults and $13 for seniors and for children aged 2 to 18.

On the 26th, Kato will hold a "hands-on workshop" at the Pittsburgh Zen Center in Sewickley:

Mr. Kato will do a brief demonstration of the history of bunjinga, show examples of his artwork, and review basic techniques.

Guests will also be able to partake in sencha tea ceremony while they watch the demonstration.

The cost is $10 for Pittsburgh Zen Center members and $20 for the general public. Registration is required and can be completed online. The Pittsburgh Zen Center is located at 124 Willow Ridge Rd. in Sewickley (map).

Attack on Titan (進撃の巨人) at Hollywood Theater in Dormont, from September 30.

The first of two Attack on Titan (進撃の巨人) films will play at the Hollywood Theater in Dormont on September 30, October 1, and October 7. The movie was released in Japan on August 1. The second film, Attack on Titan: End of the World (進撃の巨人 エンド オブ ザ ワールド) is due for a September 19 release, and will play at the Hollywood Theater on October 20, 22, and 27. A brief summary, from Tech Times:

The movies are based on a popular manga and anime series of the same name, where humanity lives behind massive walls to protect themselves against the threat of massive man-eating giants known as Titans. The story revolves around a young group of men and women who enlist in their city's armed forces to drive back the Titans after a never before seen "Colossal Titan" breaches the walls.

Tickets are currently available for Attack on Titan, which will be shown in Japanese with English subtitles. The theater is located at 1449 Potomac Ave. in Dormont (map), and is accessible by Pittsburgh's subway/LRT at a block south of Potomac Station.

2014 Zhang Yimou film Coming Home (归来) at Regent Square Theater from October 16.

It was recently announced that the 2014 Chinese film Coming Home (归来), directed by Zhang Yimou and starring Gong Li, will play at the Regent Square Theater from October 16. A New York Times review from September 8 summarizes a bit:

“Coming Home,” only [Zhang and Li's] second collaboration in the past 20 years, reunites them in an intimate, politically resonant story set in the final years and the immediate aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. Ms. Gong plays Feng Wanyu, a teacher in a provincial city whose husband, Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming), a professor, has been sent to a labor camp in a purge of “rightists.” Feng Wanyu lives with their teenage daughter, Dan Dan (Zhang Huiwen), a dancer who dreams of playing the lead in the ballet “The Red Detachment of Women.” Her father’s pariah status threatens her ambition, and she is eager to denounce him when local officials demand it.

Early in the film, Lu Yanshi has escaped and made his way home in a doomed and desperate effort to see his family again. He receives a mixed welcome. Feng Wanyu is both terrified and eager to be with him, while Dan Dan, who barely remembers her father, is worried about the disruptive effect his presence will have on her life. Her selfishness and shortsightedness, and her inability to sympathize with her parents or put aside her own needs are all perfectly normal. She’s an adolescent, after all. But in a time of political extremity, ordinary feelings and actions can have terrible consequences. Innocent people do not only suffer under a ruthless system; they become agents of its cruelty.

Zhang and Li partnered on several of the most acclaimed Chinese movies of the 1990s, including Ju Dou (菊豆), Raise the Red Lantern (大红灯笼高高挂), The Story of Qiu Ju (秋菊打官司), and To Live (活著).

Showtimes and ticket information are not available at the Pittsburgh Filmmakers website at the time of this post. The theater is located at 1035 S. Braddock Ave. (map) in the Regent Square neighborhood, east of Squirrel Hill and Oakland.

Anime series at Row House Cinema, September 25 through October 1.

The Row House Cinema in Lawrenceville will host an anime series that will run from September 25 to October 1. The lineup includes: Akira (アキラ), Ghost in the Shell (攻殻機動隊), When Marnie Was There (思い出のマーニー), and Perfect Blue (パーフェクトブルー).

Japanese animation (or anime) is a diverse art form which comes in a variety of artistic styles and genres. While the themes of anime vary from sci-fi to horror to action to drama, one thing these films share in common is a focus on creating a cinematographic experience through the use of backgrounds and camera effects. This week we take a look at three Japanese animation classics as well as the most recent (and possibly final) release from Studio Ghibli, whose films include the three highest-grossing anime movies of all time.

Movies will be shown in Japanese with English subtitles. Showtimes and tickets are now available at the theater's website.

Japanese language exchange in Shadyside, September 25.

The Japan-America Society of Pennsylvania's Japanese language exchange this month is scheduled for Friday, September 25. Like the others, it will be held in Kenmawr Apartments, located at 401 Shady Ave. (map). It runs from 4:00 to 6:00 pm in the Community Room and is free and open to the public.