AP Art of the Week
Spotlight on Artist Jungwon Hwang
Welcome to The Elective’s digital art museum, dedicated to the incredible work of AP Arts students. This week we feature a mixed-media work made by Jungwon Hwang from Crescenta Valley High School in La Crescenta, California.
Welcome to The Elective’s digital art museum, dedicated to the incredible work of AP Arts students. Each week we highlight a work or series created in one of the AP Arts concentrations—AP 2-D Art and Design, 3-D Art and Design, and AP Drawing (the AP Program also offers Art History and Music Theory)—as well as a statement from the artist (and, occasionally, their teacher).
From the first cave paintings to contemporary breakthroughs in virtually reality, art, in all its forms, has been a crucial way for people to process, make sense of, comment on, and grapple with the world around them. In 2020, there is a lot to process and grapple with—and AP Art students have risen to the challenge. The work many of them submitted in their final portfolios is explicitly of the moment, from commentary on the covid-19 pandemic to the celebration of people of color to the nature of heroism in perilous times.
The work is often challenging and provocative but always insightful, inspiring, and expansive.
This week we feature a mixed-media work made by Jungwon Hwang from Crescenta Valley High School in La Crescenta, California.
Here’s Jungwon’s statement on the work:
“What are some of the conflicts Asian Americans have experienced in history and currently? This artwork gives honor to Chinese immigrants who endured discrimination during the Gold Rush in California. This memorial was made using soy candle wax, metal chain, a 20-inch-long black wig, electric saw, and an 80 inch x 50 inch wooden board. I cut plywood into the shape of California state, layered wax and candle over the surface and glued the hairstyle.”
And here are a few other works from Jungwon’s portfolio:
Americans thought that immigrants were conveniently available to use for labors like canned food. (foam spray, gold spray paint, wooden figure, white/denim fabric, can, black wig)
Sculpted a brain out of ice with pink dye and string lights, surrounded with colorful slimes.
Koi fish are an adaptable fish that immigrated all over the world, representing my immigrant story. I made a fish with wires and glued rubber balls, hanging from the ceiling, with a painting of water on the wall.
I sprayed yellow and poured paint on the mannequin on top of white clay like an egg.
Student statements are lightly edited for length and clarity.
