Doodles that Followed

Extra doodles of Hanbok, because they are awesome

Bright New Things Takes Times Square

The fourth week of March was nothing but calm and usual as always, until I was told that there is a competition with an upcoming due date. My colleague and friend Karen JY Sung's amazing coffee house/cafe drawings (which you can check out here) was recently selected by the previous competition <Bright New Things Take Hackney>. She was invited to fly over to London and participate in a workshop with other winning designers and artists. 

With the cold symptoms residing, I decided to apply with just 3 to 4 days until deadline. If I enter and win, I'll get to visit New York! If I enter but do not win, I get to add a new project in my portfolio. There was nothing to loose.

Applicants were asked to choose one of either a table, a chair, or a lamp and use color and pattern to transform these ordinary objects into an interesting concept. I've always loved exploring Korean cultural heritage. So I made a series of motifs by combining my personal style and traditional Korean art. The result can be seen below.

And the following are detailed shots of individual motifs. 

Land of Morning Calm - Hanbok Series II

2017 was a year full of reaching out and making friends, of self-discovery and expanding on breadth of my work. One of many good things that I was involved in was a call for entry to <Send Me Across The Sea>, an exhibit initiated by dear colleagues Diana Xu and Malisa Suchanya in San Francisco.

For last year's exhibit, I submitted a series of hanbok paintings -a series of ten beneath- that each told a unique story (or concept, should I say). This year I wanted to step up my game and deliver something with more intricacy and diverse sources.

The result was a series of eight, painted in watercolor and gouache, which you can see at the top. I believe they each carry narrative quality similar to that of myths/legends with a hint of pop culture. A small but big step towards putting out more Korean images out there!

Hanbok Series 1

I've always been interested in tradition (somewhat forgotten, sadly) and current sociopolitical landscape of my country, Korea.  

As an effort to promoting Korean tradition, I often like to use hanbok - Korean traditional outfit - as the central theme of my illustration. These paintings below were created for an exhibit "Send Me Across The Sea"  which was organized by honorable colleague Malisa Suchanya, and held in San Francisco, USA in 2016.

Every one of them were hand painted on a postcard sized hot pressed papers with watercolor and gouache.