Kang Hun, a pop music critic who rose to prominence in the 1990s and served as chairman of the Korea Arts and Culture Education Service, has died. He was 64.
Kang died on the afternoon of the 20th, according to cultural sector officials. The cause of death was not disclosed.
Born in Busan in 1962, Kang studied Korean language and literature at Seoul National University before pursuing music theory at the university's graduate school of music.
He entered the field of pop music criticism after writing a review of singer Kim Hyun-sik at the request of a junior colleague. From the 1990s, he built his reputation contributing music criticism to a range of publications.
"From the early 1990s, Kang Hun created a sensation in music criticism with his elegant writing," said Lim Jin-mo, a pop music critic. "At the time there was a saying, 'Kang Hun for Korean pop, Lim Jin-mo for Western pop.' We worked alongside each other for a long time."
Kang co-founded the cultural quarterlies Yegam, Sangsang and Review with colleagues, and taught the history of popular music for 20 years at universities including Hongik, Sungkonghoe, Dankook and Sungkyunkwan.
He was also active in film and the performing arts. As part of the independent film collective Jangsangotmae, he took part in producing "Oh! Land of Dreams," "The Night Before the Strike" and "Opening the Closed School Gate." He wrote the screenplays for the films "When Adam Opens His Eyes" and "Jungle Story," as well as the script for the television drama "The Third Theater."
His production credits also include the concerts "Freedom" and the 30th Anniversary Folk Festival, and the musical theater works "The Song That Never Ends," "Cheonbyeon Salon," "Cheonbyeon Cabaret" and "The Princess Cannot Sleep."
At 42, he suffered an aortic tear and spent 23 days in a coma. After recovering, he studied myeongni, the Korean tradition of fate reading, and published "Myeongni: Reading Destiny" in 2015.
Kang previously served as chief executive of the Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation and as the fifth president of the Korean Regional Culture and Arts Foundations Association. He was appointed chairman of the Korea Arts and Culture Education Service in December last year.