Na Kyung-soo’s images always begin with the act of making. Her work is less about drawing and more about a kind of structural experiment—a material event born from the encounter of line, color, paper, and ink. The pressure of her hands, the spread of pigment, and the texture of paper operate as a language of their own, one that crosses the boundaries between painting, craft, printmaking, and design. Na is not so much a draughtswoman as a craftsperson who refines images through touch and repetition.

Lacquer is a quiet record of time. The raw sap extracted from the lacquer tree absorbs not only the brush and the artisan’s hand, but also light, air, and the slow accumulation of time itself. When light settles upon wood, it deepens along the grain of years. Lacquer is not a mere material—it is an art of layers built from patience, human touch, and time.

Korean lacquer artist Sojung Pyeon translates this silent process into a language of contemporary sensibility. Her work reveals the material and emotional depth of lacquer, transforming it from a craft into an art form that contains time itself. Each of her objects embodies the tension between tradition and modernity, matter and emotion—painted landscapes of color shaped by the passage of years.

Trained in metalcraft and Oriental painting, Pyeon earned certification as a Cultural Heritage Restoration Technician (漆匠, Chiljang), grounding her work in the discipline of traditional Korean lacquer craft. Her approach extends beyond revival: she overlays traditional technique with modern perception, expanding lacquer’s presence from utilitarian tableware to spatial art objects. What emerges from her hands is not just craft, but a form of living art—objects that hold and reflect time.