Ria's Art Archive
As much as I love fine art, I also love hands-on, creative projects that are hard to capture in a single slide of a portfolio page (and deserve its own website!).
Many stemmed from trying to solve a problem in my community,
& there are plenty that stem from my infinite curiosity.
Project 1
Project.Unwired
Global NPO bridging generations through communal art. Visiting weekly to elderly homes with students, and publishing intergenerational art project guides with conversation starters on our Instagram with 800 followers.
Project 3
Sensory Translations
This project turns biodata into real-time generative art, giving people who struggle to verbalize their emotions a new way to express their emotions.
Project 5
The Preview
about this project
Projects
Project 2
Unfinished Conversations
Sending the words we never got to say to friends who are no longer here on a kite, trying to touch the sky. This project with a kite kit that I designed fosters communal empathy, because empathy is something to be practiced and learned.
Project 4
Fit to Serve
After hearing about how women military uniforms are uncomfortable, I decided to try and design one tailored for women, fitted to serve.
Project 6
Pelican Pocket
A pocket-sized mental health toolkit that anyone can make from this A3 paper, containing of a pelican (Loomis Chaffee's mascot) origami, and 6 cards with 24 different illustrations. Each card contains tips, guidance, and exercises for mental well-being. Incorporated into official school curriculum and used in CT libraries.
Who Am I?
Hi! I'm Sunwoo (Ria) An.
I explore the world and my & my world's hearts with art.
I experiment with all kinds of mediums and themes. I am taking College-Level Art in The Loomis Chaffee School, and am the Head Curator of Loomis Chaffee's Mercy Gallery. I am also the president of Unwired, a global NPO bridging intergenerational gaps through communal art, where we visit Kimberly Hall in CT each week with 10+ students working with 20+ elderly; I have expanded it globally, to Korea, Hong Kong, and Thailand. I'm the designer of Pelican Pocket, an illustrated mental health origami toolkit that is officially included in the school's Sophomore Seminars and used in CT libraries, and am the illustrator of Unspoken Valor: Voices of Our Women Veterans, and strive to do a lot of work with art for my community.
As long as I can remember, I've been keenly observant.
Perhaps it's the influence of my endlessly inquisitive dad or my artist mom.
And as long as I can remember, I've also loved to...
...draw,
using all kinds of mediums,
...build, whether that's with legos,
books,
that I became one everyday:
a superhero that solves every mystery,
can gift happiness with stickers,
use bubbleguns to cure sickness,
navigate the dark underground and get rid of sadness,
know every music and word and language in the CD and tell people,
and many, many more.
Thing is, I also adored superheroes so much,
I thought I stopped doing this, in the sake of reality. What I realized, though, is that art was what made this possible, both then & now. I may not be able to cure cancer, but I can digest its pain with a paintbrush or light up a smile with a pop of color; I may not be able to fly to the clouds to meet my own grandma, but I can create memories by making sock snowmen together with the elderly that will make their day float.
So I strive to be a superhero each day, because with art, everything I imagine is real.
And so, I call myself an "artist."
sand & mud,
or anything lying around.
(yes, my first ever dream was to become a firefighter for the longest time)
