ABOUT THE ARTIST

Korean-American artist Kiwon Wang, studied metalsmithing at Georgia State University and earned a Masters in Jewelry and Light Metal from the Rhode Island School of Design. Her work has appeared in numerous exhibitions in the United States, Germany, UK, Japan and Korea. She has also taught at the Rhode Island School of Design and at Kookmin University in Korea. Jewelry by Kiwon Wang has been published and reviewed in numerous newspapers, magazines and books, including Graphis, New York Magazine, Ornament, Rebound by Louis Vuitton and Boston Globe to name a few. She currently resides in New York.

ABOUT THE WORK

Wang is an artist working in the medium of jewelry. Her materials are diverse: silver, gold, facted precious stones, steel, wool, rice paper and paper from copies of the New York Times. Native to Korea and now a permanent resident of the United States, she seeks a balance between the two cultures by the exploring the traditions of each. “My work is based on the theme ‘East Meets West,’ which is the meeting and interplay between material and form, method, technique and literature. …I test Eastern traditional boundaries and Western modern boundaries though contrast, tension, absence and presence.”

There is no question that a strong conceptual content underlies her work. Many times, her pieces push the margins of jewelry and cross into the realm of pure sculpture. While Wang accepts the intellectual challenge of her artwork, she does so with a sense of fun and strong design.

The “Dream” series, which is characterized by cylinders of densely compacted newsprint disks, delights nonetheless. This work is highly tactile. Pearls and shots of color, along with Korean characters and Western alphabet letters, branch antennae-like, off the surface. They pop and spring from the paper surface and assert the joyful sincerity of her jewelry.

MUSEUM COLLECTIONS

Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY Samuel Dorsky Art Museum, SUNY, New Paltz, NY