Written by Ally Abruscato. Photo courtesy of Namwon Choi
What better way to understand and learn about art than from actual artists? SCAD is well-known for brilliant professors who actively work in the fields they teach. One of these talented creators is Foundations Studies Professor, Namwon Choi. While some may classify themselves as artists or teachers, Professor Choi said that for her, “It’s not this or that. I’m everything. I’m all.”
Choi was surrounded by art from a young age as her father was a painter. She knew she was meant to sustain his legacy. Choi had a brief moment of doubt during college, as we all do, and quit painting for a couple years. After reevaluation, she realized that painting is what she truly wanted and hasn’t stopped since. Quite literally, Choi makes time to paint every day despite her busy life as a professor and parent.
In her most recent paintings, Choi has been “taking the idea of distance as a subject matter.” This idea stems from many parts of her life, including her connection to Savannah and the United States. As a Korean American, Choi feels a distance between both aspects of her identity. Although she never feels fully American, she also never feels entirely Korean.
To portray this, Choi paints highways in limited color palettes with unique shapes. While others may find the idea of painting a highway boring, Choi loved the idea that she was “going to be the first to paint a highway.” Choi relates the color blue to distance and has combined her monochromatic paintings with brightly colored borders that remind the viewer of a computer or phone screen. She also wanted to do something new with the shapes of easels and canvases, and create “not something their landscape, something my landscape.” Instead of the traditional rectangular canvas, Choi experiments with different geometrical shapes. Overall, Choi has been creating uncommon and unprecedented work with a nontraditional subject matter, limited color palette and rare canvas shape.
While it can be very demanding to be a professor as well as an artist, Choi feels obligated to her students to continue creating her work. She feels she must be active in the art field in order to speak about what is current.
Choi recently had the opportunity to display some of her work in her solo exhibition, “The Shape of Distance” at Virginia Tech’s Moss Art Center in Blacksburg. If you’re interested in exploring more of Professor Choi’s work, you can check out her website or Instagram!
