© 2025 “Echoes of Han” poster
Echoes of Han: Fragments of Self, Memory, Identity, and Transformation
2025 AHLumni Exhibition Exhibition
- The inaugural AHL-Founder S.N. Kim Grant Exhibition, established by AHL Foundation President and Founder Sook Nyu Lee Kim in 2024
- Curated by DeePond Kim
- Exhibition Dates: June 7–July 3, 2025, Wednesday–Saturday, 12pm–6pm
- Exhibition Location: AHL Foundation (2605 Frederick Douglass Blvd, New York, NY 10030)
- Artists: Seongmin Ahn, Heejung Cho, Sung Ho Choi, Tai Hwa Goh, Hong Seon Jang, DeepPond Kim, Suzy Taekyung Kim, Judy Junghee Koo, Kakyoung Lee, Eunsook Lee, Jiyoun Lee-Lodge, Jayoung Yoon
AHL Foundation Gallery is pleased to announce Echoes of Han: Fragments of Self, Memory, Identity, and Transformation, the 1st AHL Foundation Alumni Group Exhibition, featuring twelve artists of Korean heritage: Seongmin Ahn, Heejung Cho, Sung Ho Choi, Tai Hwa Goh, Hong Seon Jang, DeepPond Kim, Suzy Taekyung Kim, Judy Junghee Koo, Kakyoung L
ee, Eunsook Lee, Jiyoun Lee-Lodge, and Jayoung Yoon. Curated by DeepPond Kim, the exhibition will be on view at AHL Foundation Gallery(2605 Frederick Douglass Blvd. #C1, New York, NY 10030) from June 7 through July 3, 2025.
Rooted in the Korean concept of Han, a profound emotion intertwining sorrow, longing, endurance, and hope, Echoes of Han brings together artists who explore the intertwined
themes of identity, memory, cultural heritage, and personal transformation. Through diverse materials and methods, including clay, paper, wood, hair, and both digital and traditional practices, these artists give form to the nuanced layers of transformative experience, crafting works that are both deeply personal and universally resonant.
It is said that Han emerges from historical trauma, collective memory, and personal hardship; it’s both individual and shared. Echoes of Han carves out a space where vulnerability and strength meet, and tradition collides with reinvention. In both abstract and representational works, the human body becomes a persistent thread, fragmented, reshaped, and reimagined. Through their practices, the artists weave together personal memories and collective histories, turning the creative process into an act of healing and quiet reflection, inviting viewers to witness a collective meditation on transformation.
This exhibition marks the inaugural AHL-Founder S.N. Kim Grant Exhibition, established by AHL Foundation President and Founder Sook Nyu Lee Kim in 2024. The series began with a solo exhibition by Ran Hwang, the first recipient of AHL’s Contemporary Visual Art Award in 2004 and Echoes of Han is the first group exhibition to be organized and presented by AHL Foundation alumni artists.
President Sook Nyu Lee Kim shared, “AHL Foundation has always valued community. I’m proud and deeply moved to see our alumni artists who
have grown alongside AHL for over two dec
ades come together for such a meaningful exhibition. As long as I’m able, I will continue supporting open calls and opportunities for our alumni, and I look forward to their ongoing engagement and participation.”
Artist Talk and Archive of Korean Artists in America (AKAA) Room Tour
On June 21, 2025, AHL Foundation hosted an artist talk and a guided tour of the Archive of Korean Artists in America (AKAA) Room, held in conjunction with its exhibition Echoes of Han: Fragments of Self, Memory, Identity, and Transformation.
The artist talk featured artists Heejung Cho, Jayoung Yoon, and Sung Ho Choi, who spoke about the concepts and stories behind their works on view. Visitors had the opportunity to engage directly with the artists while viewing the exhibition. Following the talk, Jiyeong Lee, Director of AHL Foundation, led a tour of the AKAA Room and introduced the project’s mission and history, along with a walkthrough of the AKAA website. The program concluded with a conversation on the role and importance of archival practice, led by Dr. Soojung Hyun, Research Fellow at AHL Foundation, and artist Sung Ho Choi.
President Sook Nyu Lee Kim remarked, “It was a meaningful day in which the Foundation’s past and future came together through the long-standing AKAA project and our first-ever alumni group exhibition. AHL Foundation remains committed to supporting and documenting the work of Korean and Korean diasporic artists in the U.S., and we hope you will look forward to the newly redesigned AKAA website, coming soon.”
Artist Biographies
Seongmin Ahn is a multidisciplinary artist whose work bridges traditional Korean aesthetics with contemporary media and technology. Her practice explores the fusion of painting and sculpture, most notably in her Painting-Object series, which combines ink drawings on mulberry paper with digital processes and laser-cut birch plywood. By transforming flat imagery into multi-layered surfaces, Ahn evokes humor and moments of joy and reflection. Her work has been exhibited at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (Korea), Jordan Schnitzer Museum, and Charles Wang Center, and is part of collections including the Princeton University Art Museum and the Hudson River Museum. Ahn has received support from institutions such as the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, CUE Art Foundation, and AHL Foundation.
Based in Brooklyn, Heejung Cho is a mixed-media artist from Seoul whose work investigates the interplay of memory, imagination, and the physical world. Working with materials like plaster, resin, and reclaimed wood, Cho creates abstracted structures that challenge fixed narratives and invite introspection. Her sculptures and prints evoke fragmented spaces and human forms, encouraging viewers to engage with their own memories. She holds a BFA and MFA in Sculpture and Visual Art and has been recognized through numerous fellowships and residencies.
Sung Ho Choi is a Korean-born multidisciplinary artist who has lived and worked in New York City and Bergen County, NJ since 1981. His work examines bi-cultural identity and the complexities of being “the other” in a transnational context. Drawing from personal experience, he constructs visual systems that reflect cultural collision, transformation, and healing. Over four decades, Choi’s work has been exhibited across the Americas and Asia, and he has received awards from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, NEA, Rockefeller Foundation, and AHL Foundation. A committed educator and cultural advocate, he co-founded the Seoro Korean Cultural Network in 1990.
Tai Hwa Goh is a printmaker and installation artist who transforms traditional printmaking into immersive sculptural environments. Her layered, hand-printed paper structures reference biological growth, memory, and emotional rhythms, merging the architectural with the organic. With MFAs from Seoul National University and the University of Maryland, Goh has exhibited at institutions such as Wave Hill and IPCNY, and received support from the NEA, AHL Foundation, and Vermont Studio Center. Her work invites viewers into delicate yet complex spaces that reflect ecological and psychological cycles.
Hong Seon Jang is a multidisciplinary artist with an MFA from Rochester Institute of Technology and training from Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. He reinterprets everyday objects to reveal overlooked meanings and hidden narratives, transforming them into visual metaphors of memory, time, and material culture. Through international exhibitions and residencies—including ISCP, Tokyo Wonder Site, and Meet Factory—Jang has explored how material transformation can challenge symbolic norms. His work invites viewers to see the familiar anew.
DeepPond Kim is a South Korean artist whose work explores the pressures that shape our understanding of the human body. Drawing from traditional Korean jar-making, she creates emotionally resonant, abstracted figures that normalize discomfort and emphasize empathy, especially toward marginalized communities. With an MFA from Pratt Institute and a BFA from Sungshin Women’s University, Kim has exhibited at SPRING/BREAK Art Fair, Equity Gallery, and more. She was the first recipient of the AHL Foundation Artist Fellowship and a 2024 AIM Fellow at the Bronx Museum.
Born in Daegu, South Korea, Suzy Taekyung Kim is a painter whose work reflects themes of healing and the quiet beauty of nature. Through subtle layers of color and texture, her paintings offer meditative spaces that honor fleeting moments and emotional resilience. Educated at Emily Carr University, the University of British Columbia, and NYU, Kim’s work has been featured in collections worldwide and through public art projects in Canada, the UK, South Korea, and the UAE.
Judy Junghee Koo is a Korean-American artist based in New Jersey whose paintings construct emotional, symbolic landscapes. Using eyes as central motifs, she builds narratives of memory, desire, and introspection through fragmented compositions. Her dark yet vibrant palettes create psychologically rich environments. Koo earned her MFA from Hunter College and BFA from Rutgers University. Her work has been exhibited at The Cluster Gallery and Central Park Gallery, and she received a 2024 NJ State Council on the Arts Fellowship.
Brooklyn-based artist Kakyoung Lee works in printmaking, drawing, and time-based media to explore invisible and cyclical moments of daily life. Through sequential drawing and stop-motion animation, she captures fleeting gestures and subtle shifts. As a Korean American artist, her work delves into marginalization, identity, and memory through processes of repetition and erasure. She has exhibited at MoMA, the Met, and Queens Museum, and her work is held in major collections including the National Gallery of Art and Asia Society Museum.
Eunsook Lee is a Korean-born fiber and installation artist whose practice evolved after a transformative fire during her first solo show in 1986. She began crafting luminous, thread-based installations that explore mortality, hope, and healing. Her transparent, blacklight-infused structures exist between visibility and invisibility, inviting contemplation of resilience and spiritual continuity. Lee holds degrees from Ewha Womans University and Hongik University and has exhibited widely across the US, Germany, and Asia.
Jiyoun Lee-Lodge is a Korean-born artist based in Salt Lake City, Utah, whose work examines identity through the lens of media, globalization, and migration. Influenced by animation and surrealism, she creates hybrid portraiture that captures the shifting and fluid nature of cultural belonging. Lee-Lodge holds a BFA from Chung-Ang University and an MFA from Brooklyn College, and has exhibited in diverse public spaces across New York, Utah, and South Korea.
Jayoung Yoon is a multidisciplinary artist known for her meditative, hair-woven sculptures that embody themes of presence, memory, and interconnectedness. By using human hair—a material both intimate and symbolic—she constructs ephemeral forms that evoke quiet reflection and spiritual awareness. Based in Beacon, NY, Yoon holds a BFA from Hongik University and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art. Her work has been exhibited at the Bronx Museum and Contemporary Craft, and she has received support from the Joan Mitchell Foundation, Skowhegan, and MacDowell.
