Stephanie Kim

Stephanie Kim is a former software engineer turned ceramic artist. Stephanie is constantly pushing herself to explore new techniques and styles, always striving to improve and evolve her craft. She creates large sculptural forms, each one adorned with intricate and expressive drawings that bring her creations to life.

Research Detail

My work focuses on the personal components of multi-layered identity, using life experiences and memory. By honing in on specific niche emotions, I aim to connect with the audience intimately. My Korean American background is a large part of my identity, manifesting in my work through symbolism and conceptual ideas. My unconventional path from software developer to artist is also a large influence in my work, lending itself to ideas of transition, convergence, and innovation. Through my art practice I investigate my life so far, uncovering stepping stones of memory once thought to be insignificant. Through ceramic sculptures and experimental digital visualizations through code, I strive to push the bounds of contemporary art while maintaining genuine connection with the viewers.

I consider my life-size figurative sculptural work my primary medium as it taps into our innate sense of a person’s presence. Using presence as a vehicle, I use the sculpture’s surface to convey Korean identity through illustrated motifs and various glazes as an abstract nod to multi-layered identity. Clay as a medium is crucial to my art practice. Clay holds the memory of a person’s touch, easily bent and pinched into the form I have in mind. Every finger print in the clay is intimately human and personal, connecting me to the audience. At the same time, ceramic sculptures are stagnant, often left to be looked at but not interacted with. Coded visualizations and interactive applications transform my work to become fluid and dynamic. I view this melding to be a marriage of the laborious craft of clay and the innovative frontier of technology. I am not trying to make my ceramic practice more technology-related, like with 3D clay printing, nor am I completely abstracting away the logical elements of coding. Instead, I embrace both aspects of hand-crafted labor and new-age technology at full volume.

My art practice is ever evolving as I inspect the hidden corners of my mind. I use code and clay to illustrate multi-layered identity as a visual experience. Each sculpture becomes a personal narrative, but also an invitation for collective recognition. As my background is multifaceted, I anticipate viewers to recognize themselves in my work in one way or form. My sculptures do not provide answers of how Korean American identity is supposed to feel but rather to normalize its uncertainty and ambiguity.