We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Eunsuh Choi a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Eunsuh, thank you so much for taking the time to share your lessons learned with us and we’re sure your wisdom will help many. So, one question that comes up often and that we’re hoping you can shed some light on is keeping creativity alive over long stretches – how do you keep your creativity alive?
One of the characteristics that make the human experience such a unique one is that we all share a longing for personal enrichment. The search for individual fulfillment is a deep-seated pursuit within all of us. No matter how significant or superficial one’s ambition might be, it is the presence of aspiration that beckons us as humans to somehow claim or carve out our own understanding of ourselves within our lifetime. Although there is much attention and sensitivity towards the things that make us very different from one another, there is an undeniable connection in that we all desire something better for ourselves. This impulse is the impetus within my sculptural work, work that visually communicates the spiritual essence of human ambition. My work specifically focuses on communicating the graceful flow of our emotional tendencies through the plastic medium of flameworked glass. I like to work sculpturally, utilizing form and its surrounding atmosphere to portray narratives based on the human encounter with success and failure in the pursuit of personal ambition.
I’m interested in portraying human aspiration with organic forms from the new perspective I had about myself within a foreign country. Originally from South Korea, I relocated to the United States. My Korean heritage tends to make me question myself in terms of my direction as an artist and an individual especially here in the USA. To address my interest in human aspiration, I like to integrate my personal philosophy and experience incorporating my Korean heritage into the work to merge my Eastern background and my Western experiences, like how we, as humankind, are unified through the sensation of personal ambition.
The structures that I create within recent work resemble objects that the viewer is familiar with in daily living. Ladders, trees, clouds, boxes, houses, and even hybrids of the five appear as reoccurring formal motifs.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
As a teacher, I need to provide my students with skills, both technical and critical, which they need in order to envision and execute effective work. To this end, I try to convey my enthusiasm for sculpture and the medium of glass, and encourage students to find and develop their own creative voices. The primary responsibility of a teacher is to prepare students to make their way in the world as a creative professional. It is important to be flexible and acknowledge the full range of possible career paths graduates will follow. I consider the eventual professional success of my students to be the real test of my effectiveness as a teacher. I acknowledge and try to prepare my female students for the particular challenges that they face when choosing to pursue a career in the glass art. There is a predominance of males among the ranks of well-known artists, graduate students, glassblowers in production studios, and professors in glass programs. To this end, I try to instill confidence in these young women through positive reinforcement of achievements and improvements. I have also been careful to foster a supportive environment in the department that encourages information sharing and discourages intimidation. I find that an atmosphere that fosters healthy competition can also encourage productive collaboration.
In conclusion, I try to create an atmosphere of enthusiastic but self-disciplined creativity in my classes. I see our program as a sort of hothouse where ideas can flourish unencumbered by so called “practical concerns”. When it comes time for them to enter the professional world, I believe it is this experience of truly open creative brainstorming that can actually give our students an important edge over those that have never been able to take time away from the commercial milieu to explore and develop their full creative potential. My students have had the experiences; they may have been too timid, self-editing, and conservative in their ideas to really break new ground. I want them to discover the greatness that each of them is capable of achieving.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
As an artist, knowledge in your area with high skill is important to build your artist career and maintain it as well as engaging with clients to sell your artwork to survive. Important creative growth can only be achieved through constant work. I try to instill a strong work ethic in my students that will eventually be self-imposed and continue after they graduate. I have sought to build an environment in which students encourage each other to put in extra hours. I live my own professional life in consideration of my responsibility to serve as an example to my students. They see me experimenting with new forms in glass studio, finishing work for upcoming exhibitions and interacting with clients.
To close, maybe we can chat about your parents and what they did that was particularly impactful for you?
I transferred to other university in glass after I graduated college in textile design. During the first semester in glass, I really hated what I learned and what I’d done. All I wanted was going back to fashion/textile design. I asked my parents to help me to study again to transfer to other school. They asked me to try just another semester, then they will help me financially so I can focused on studying and drawing in order to transfer again. During that second semester, I was lucky enough to take a beadmaking class and I felt in love right away. If my parents didn’t tell me to try one more time, I wouldn’t be here today as a glass artist and a teacher even as a glass director.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.choiglass.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eunsuhchoi/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Choiglas/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/choiglass/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/eunsuh1001
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@eunsuhchoi/featured
Image Credits
Photo Credit: Eunsuh Choi and Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark
