Spotlight Artist

Minji Choi

MFA Annual
Minji Choi's headshot

Mirror

Abstract painting of a face with bold brush strokes and mixed colors, conveying intense emotion.

monoprint on paper

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Abstract painting of a face with bold brush strokes and mixed colors, conveying intense emotion.
Subscriber accessSubscribe to gain full access to all artworksSubscribe
Abstract painting of a face with bold brush strokes and mixed colors, conveying intense emotion.
Featured in New American Paintings1 / 3

Artist Statement

My work begins with writing. Short poems or fragments of a novel weaving together symbols and narrative. These texts are metaphors for the people and society I have observed. They invite us into the role of a protagonist, or to stand before scenes that do not exist, feeling familiarity and estrangement at once.

I write about the human desire to belong. Something observed and lived. This desire surfaces as a fragile pursuit, a mirage of love and recognition.
I trace the two faces of intimacy:
How affection becomes a language of negotiation,
how comfort conceals vulnerability,
how a relationship functions as both shelter and surveillance.
As a Korean woman, I respond through gestures of quiet resistance, turning softness into a question.

Through painting, I construct quiet scenes attending to the tension between attachment and autonomy. Thin, layered surfaces linger like marks, faint yet resistant to erasure. Sharp forms and symbols are placed as if issuing quiet commands to figures within. The figures pause. Caught between the desire to be held and to remain wholly oneself.

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Education

  • MFA candidate, Columbia University, New York, NY, US
  • BFA, Hongik University, Seoul, KR

Solo Exhibitions

  • Penciling the Futile, Gallery DOS, Seoul, KR

Selected Group Exhibitions

  • Half a Footstep, Gallery Depthend, Seoul, KR
  • Le Goût Vernissage, Galerie La Teinturerie, Richelieu, FR
  • Lighter Than a Period, Heavier Than a Comma, Hongik University Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, KR
  • Nudes, Hongik University Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, KR
  • Cry Out! Yas, Hongik University, Seoul, KR
  • First Year MFA Exhibition, Wallach Art Gallery, new york, NY, US

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