My dad never tried to refinish my room, even though paints are everywhere on the wall and tiles look dirty because that’s where my dream started. My mom listened to a fortune teller to let me choose whatever I’d like to study in the future. She displaced 3 things on the table: a color pencil, a harmonica, and a chess piece, which represent art, music, and logical thinking. No doubt, I picked the color pencil. Since then, I’ve never left a blank piece of paper in my room, and my dad allowed me to paint whatever I liked on the wall. I love what I am doing now, as an artist and a designer.

 

I traveled alone to Italy and Spain after saving from my first job, and that’s the first time I realized art and design is so close to our life. In Madrid, I was sitting in Almudena Cathedral for a long time and listening to the beautiful pipe organ playing like it was from far away in the past. In the peaceful moment, I let my mind go blank and listened to voices from the bottom of my heart. I asked myself why I want to be a designer and what I want to design. A good design is not just a nice poster, a cool looking book cover,  or anything that tries to sell you something. A good design is a comfortable and enlightened environment that makes me want to stay longer, is a freeway billboard that makes me say “yes, me too” while I am driving, and is a labeled recycle garbage can that allows me to put garbage in from all directions without touching it. The more I see, the more I become curious about the world. Being curious, creative, and concerned about the world encourages me to go out of my comfort zone and see things from different perspectives. I hope my design stays positive, honest , and concerned about the others.