JIMON

Hiejin Yoo

Interview by Jimon

1) Currently you live in Los Angeles, Where did you grow up?  I was born in Germany but grew up in South Korea.

2) Did you know you wanted to be a professional artist while growing up? I stared to paint when I was seven years old. My mother wanted to teach me several different things like music, art or ballet. But I was interested in painting and drawing the most. And since then I have been painting and creating.

3) What’s the best advice you’ve gotten about your art or being an artist?  Just being you is the best way to be special.

4) Do you have a routine you follow while working on a piece?  Nothing special, I always try to go to my studio early in the morning and start working on my paintings because I lose my energy at night.

5) Who is your favorite artist and why?  My all time favorite artist is Henri Mattise. His colors in the paintings are very vivid, subtly changed to give variations and painted with thin layers so we can see his brush strokes. Also, there is humor with a little detailed information that makes me smile.

6) Do you have a place/person/thing that you visit for inspiration?   I love the Japanese author; Haruki Murakami. Especially, his everyday essays are very inspiring to me.

7) Name three things you can’t live without in your studio?   Coffee, laptop, phone.

8) If you could have dinner with 3 artists living/dead who would be at your table?   Henri Mattise, Alex Katz, Nicole Eisenman.

9) Anything else you’d like to mention that I didn’t ask?

Why I chose to live in Los Angeles?  I have dreamed about becoming an artist for a long time, so I want to enrich my knowledge and advance to a higher level in order to achieve my goal. I think LA is the perfect place to do all of these.

The Following three pieces of her work are available for purchase.

Korean scrubbing  (not available)

Rollerblading (not available)

Soulmates (not available)

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