Defining Who I Am

There are certain things that I always say when I have to introduce myself to other people. One of them is the fact that I came from South Korea about five years ago. Because of that, I had to overcome some hardships to fit myself into this society. The most noticeable challenges were language and communication. I wasn’t able to understand English that well when I first got here. I felt like everybody was making fun of my accent. Thankfully, that was the time when I started taking art classes. Some Korean girl, who was always in the corner of the English classroom due to her lack of English speaking skills, was now placed in the spotlight of attention during the art class. I was able to build a lot of self-confidence, and this eventually became the motivation for my studies.

Art class was like a window that opened my mind to the American culture. Through this window, I was able to look and step forward in the American culture and perceive it with heart. I didn’t judge other cultures through my own cultural perspective. Meanwhile, I tried to reach out my Korean culture to my American friends. I made several attempts to make my projects to be related to the Korean culture. Once, the Korean traditional costume called Hanbok inspired my sculpting project. I built a basic shape of a vase and decorated its exterior with ruffle-like clays, which looked exactly the same as the dress. After a few days of research, I was able to accentuate the dress with other traditional Korean jewelry in my own design. I chose all the colors that might blend into a beautiful ensemble of traditional and modern aspects of beauty.

The art class was a great relief for me. It also made me think about what I really want to do and where I am heading in my life. The canvas always reflected my question attentively and somehow gave me the answer. That is the reason why I am  still facing the white canvas: to find answers to my questions.