This month for In Studio With, we are getting to know Korean-born, Atlanta-based artist Jiha Moon. Moon's sculptures and paintings take cues from historical and cultural references infusing them with American idioms and iconology. Her exhibition Where Serpents Change Their Skin is currently on view at Alan Avery Art Company.
1) Do you collect anything?
I try to collect art. Mostly, I trade art with my artists friends and art is the most valuable objects we have in our place.
2) If you could give your 10 year old self advice, what would it be?
Learn other languages, Have fun but don't eat too much candies. Lol
Jiha Moon in her studio
3) When and what made you decide to become an artist while living in Korea?
I did not decide. I was born to be an artist.
I did not have a choice.
4) Introvert or Extrovert?
I can be both and it takes turn.
Jiha Moon, Spirited, ink, acrylic, and hanji on canvas
5) Is there an artist you would like to collaborate with?
Lonnie Holley occasionally comes on my FB page and comments so encouragingly about my work and I get so excited. I would love to collaborate somehow. I will tell him when I see him again.
Lonnie Holley, with his artwork, copyright 2015 Hansley Institute of Contemporary Art
Read the Atlanta Journal Constitution's Review
of Jiha Moon's Where Serpents Change Their Skin
Article by Felicia Feaster
"There’s the suggestive tang of gunpowder in the air and billowing smoke seems to dissipate as we contemplate her manic miasmas of color and form..."
Jiha Moon, Fob of Leaf, earthenware, glaze, underglaze, shoelace, and found object
6) What message do you want people to take away from your art?
This is loaded question. I try not to think about viewers too much when I am in my studio. I hope they come back and look at the work more than once and make their own connection with my work.
Did you know?
Kimchi is the national dish of Korea.
It is made of spicy pickled cabbage.
7) Do you have any guilty pleasures?
I crave eating Chocolate and Kimchi.
8) Do you believe in ghosts?
Yes, I do.
9) You work in both sculpture and painting. Do you prefer one medium over the other?
I say this often but "Painting" is my husband and "ceramic sculpture" is my boy friend. (I should actually say my son instead. lol) I love them both. They also equally give me different concerns and working strategies but I hope they speak the same language.
10) Do you believe originality exists?
Yes, I do. Art should be intellectual. The way artists connecting their idea, concept and story with visual language should be original which affect viewing hugely. "Nothing is new, everything is done" is such an old idiom to me because you don't value artist thinking process first.
Jiha Moon in her studio with her dog, Pumpkin
JIHA MOON'S EXHIBITION
WHERE SERPENTS CHANGE THEIR SKIN
View the exhibition though January 5th at Alan Avery Art Company
Alan Avery Art Company is open Tuesday - Friday 10 am - 6 pm and Saturday 11 am - 5 pm
Check the website for holiday hours
The exhibition is free and open to the public
Polaroid of Jiha Moon with her sculpture, Immortal Desert 3, photo by Benjamin Deaton
