Politics

THE YEAR FRANCE KOREA FROM SEPTEMBER 2015 TO AUGUST 2016

130th ANNIVERSARY OF RELATIONSHIP


Year FRANCE - KOREA 2015/2016 (Source: © Ruby BIRD & Yasmina BEDDOU)
Year FRANCE - KOREA 2015/2016
(Source: © Ruby BIRD & Yasmina BEDDOU)
USPA NEWS - From September 2015 to the Summer of 2016, Korea is France's featured guest. This was initiated by both the French and the korean Governements. It will mark the 130th Anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries...
There will be many events organized focussing on exchanges and common creations. The opening will be on September 19, 2015 in France lasting up to August 2016. The following year, the events will be carried out in Korea from March 2016 until December 2016. The Opening Ceremony will be on September 18 with the "Jongmoyo Jeryeak" presented by the National Gugak Center at the Theatre Chaillot (Paris). The public representation will be held on September 19, 2015.
Jongmyo Jeryeak is a unique example of a Confucian rite from the Chosen Dynasty (1392-1910), now practised juste once a year in Seoul on the first Sunday of May. It brings together song, dance and traditional court music. Jongmyo Jereak was designated as a World Cultural Heritage by UNESCO (The Spirit of a Nation). It is a royal Confucian shrine dedicated to the ancestors of the Chosen Dynasty. It is no longer celebrated in China itself. It draws on classical Chinese texts concerning the cult of the ancestors and the notion of filial piety. The rite was fixed in its present form in 15th century collections which define the order of the ceremony.
The music and dance present an alternation of the forces of Ying and Yang as set out in the Confucian text.

Nowdays, more and more people consider the ancestral rites to be formal ceremonies devoid of meaning, especially in the context of the growing importance of Christianity. The rite and the music are already protected in the National Intangible Heritage and the 1982 Law for the Protection of Cultural Property, which also protects bearers of expertise (from UNESCO)
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