Asian Art Museum of San Francisco names Korean art curator

Korean art curator named

Hyonjeong Kim Han, a curator at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, has been named curator of Korean art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.

Kim, who will assume her new duties July 1, will be responsible for one of the most comprehensive overseas collections of Korean art at one of the largest Asian art museums in the Western world.

At LACMA, Kim was instrumental in last year’s re-installation of the Korean art galleries -- the largest such galleries outside of Korea. She joined the museum in 2006 and has served as associate curator of Chinese and Korean art and as the department’s acting head and curator.

-- Karen Wada This is a day for Mister Rogers

Mister Rogers cared deeply about his neighbors and his neighborhood, both in the Neighborhood of Make-Believe and in real life. Now, friends and colleagues of late television icon Fred Rogers want to honor his legacy with a national day of volunteering on his birthday.

Rogers, who died in 2003 after battling stomach cancer, would have been 82 Saturday.

The Won’t You Be My Neighbor? Day is beginning this year in partnership with the United Way of Allegheny County, the county in which Pittsburgh is located and where the show was made.

“We’re trying to establish this as a national event, but you’ve got to start small,” said David Newell, who played Mr. McFeely on “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.” “It’s really what Fred would want to happen. He wanted to help others.”

Suggested volunteer ideas are simple acts, such as lending an ear to someone, offering to return a shopping cart or volunteering at a senior center. Around Pittsburgh, various museums and other institutions are offering free or reduced admissions to mark the day.

-- associated press ‘Days of Our Lives’ renewed

With CBS’ “Guiding Light” having been extinguished last year and its “As the World Turns” due to end in September, there was at last a modicum of reassuring news for daytime soap opera fans Friday: NBC said it had renewed “Days of Our Lives” through the 2010-11 season.

The serial is due to celebrate its 45th anniversary Nov. 8. Executive producer Ken Corday is the son of the show’s creators, Betty and Ted Corday.

NBC said its decision was based on improving ratings for the program. Through 25 weeks of the current season, “Days of Our Lives” is averaging 3.3 million viewers, the network said, a 10% improvement from the same point a year ago and its best showing in the past three years.

-- Lee Margulies ‘Atonement’ opera planned

It was a book, then an award-winning film. Now Ian McEwan’s “Atonement” is to become an opera.

McEwan says he is working on an adaptation with composer Michael Berkeley and poet Craig Raine, who will write the libretto.

McEwan told Friday’s Times newspaper in London that he wanted it to be on a grand scale, saying “it’s not a chamber piece, that’s for sure.”

“Atonement” travels from an English country house to World War II France and centers on a love affair doomed by a child’s misunderstanding.

The 2001 novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. A 2007 film adaptation starring Keira Knightley and James McAvoy was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won one, for its music score.

The newspaper said opera houses in England, Germany and the United States are in talks about co-producing the piece for a possible 2013 premiere.

-- associated press Antiquities on display in Rome

A collection of ancient Greek silverware dating to the 3rd century BC is going on display in Rome after being returned by the Metropolitan Museum in New York, Italian officials said Friday.

The 16 pieces of silverware with gold detail were returned as part of Italy’s aggressive campaign against illegal trafficking in antiquities. They include two large bowls, a cup with two handles, plates and drinking utensils.

Italian art officials said the pieces form one of the most important Hellenistic silverware collections to have survived from Sicily. The pieces are known as “The Morgantina Treasure” after the name of the ancient Greek settlement where they were excavated, near what is now the Italian city of Aidone.

The pieces came back as part of a deal with the Met that also led to the return of the Euphronios Krater, a 6th century BC painted vase that is widely regarded as one of the finest examples of its kind.

They will go on display at the Museo Nazionale Romano in the Italian capital from Saturday through May 23. The show then moves to Sicily.

-- associated press