Hae Won Sohn

33.Do you have an object, which puts you under a state of stress, shame or pressure?   
I am under a personal challenge of trying to reduce as much as plastic waste in my daily life. Although there is one thing that I can not refuse to buy, which is bubble tea. What makes it worse is that bubble tea almost can not be drank out of with out using a specific plastic straw.

Hae Won Sohn

31.Any thing that encouraged or enabled you to stay put in a certain state of mind? Something that proved to be an anchor, a reminder, a carrier, or a barrier? 
Whenever I doubt myself, I go through photo albums and spend time looking at past photos. Especially those took when I was a very young child helps me to see myself by standing in my parents and grandparents’ shoes. It helps me to see myself as someone else, some one that I should love and take good care of.

Hae Won Sohn

29.Any object whose purpose of existence or production escapes any logic?

Hae Won Sohn

28.An object, which in your opinion should never have existed in the first place?

Hae Won Sohn

26.An object that you always essentially possessed but never bought yourself even once?
Not a single bed in my life do I have which I bought for and own myself that I slept on/sleeping on. It has always been a bed my parents bought for me, a bed in a dorm room, many many airbnb rooms, some hotel rooms, and now a furnished apartment that I live in. Showing is a photo of my first day of moving into my very first and last dorm life that I had in Cranbrook Academy of Art.

Hae Won Sohn

25.Any object that you instantly need to replace with a similar one (a copy or a replica) as soon as it disappears from your reality (through expiry, loss or use)? 
My irregular period makes me waste a lot of these.

Hae Won Sohn

24.Any object, whose underlining/governing systems you always wanted to replicate?
Thinking about it, it is simply a small booklet one uses to prove identity and nationality when traveling. After one of my close friends told me that he can not live with his fiance(girl friend at that time) in her country due their different nationality and un-married status, I started being skeptical about the idea of “nation and nationality.” Sometimes, I feels odd that one is not allowed to live or stay anywhere as long as one wants, just because of the concept of a country which defines ones destiny.

Hae Won Sohn

23.Did you as a maker of any sort, create a fresh object, which in return started a chain reaction, or series of replicas, or was redesigned by others? 

During my time at graduate school I intentionally but also unintentionally created these mold parts as I was planning to make cups for a community cup sale. It was the moment I separated each pieces and display it on top of my working table to let them dry when I encountered the beauty of the objects living outside the context of “a mold”. Since then, I have been exploring the process of breaking molds of different prototype shapes, allowing me to reach to my current studio practice.

Hae Won Sohn

22.Did you experience an object that helped you think out of the box? Which pushed you to discover a mind’s elasticity?  
I encountered this object, a “coffee taster’s flavor wheel”, at a cafe my friend took me to in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In my mind, there are two types of coffee: bitter ones, less bitter ones. It is always mindblowing to know that there are so much to explore in something you disregarded, and that some people will be crazily passionate about it to create such thing which allows them to share their experience with others.

Hae Won Sohn

19.Are there any things that instill instant fear in you? 
I have “trypophobia”, which is a fear of looking at closely packed dots, holes or bumps. It is not a term which is scientifically proven or recognized, however I know I am not the only one who has instant reaction when looking at such things. This photo is an example to show that my trypo- phobia does not apply to everything. The tapiocas in bubble tea is also an example of me conquering trypophobia.

Hae Won Sohn

18.Have you ever witnessed an object becoming a thing?
On the morning of April 16, 2014, the Seweol Ferry Disaster occured. 304 people died in the disaster, most of them being secondary school students. In order to remember this disaster and the people who died, people in South Korea started wearing yellow ribbons in daily life and also during protests against the government as South Korea's former president and her political party was accused for the poor actions regarding the cause and management of the disaster. In this context, the yellow ribbon nowadays perceived as standing for a specific political party/ideology rather than representing hope in general matters.

Hae Won Sohn

15.Do you have a disobedient object in your environment?
This wifi modem had to be installed in the center of my studio apartment room according to installation instructions. The wire is extremely stiff that it would flip the modem if I attempt to tape it down. I have to live with this visual unpleasantness since I can not live with out wifi.

Hae Won Sohn

14.A thing whose sole meaning comes from its unique material, which is one of its kind whose traits and attributes can not be reproduced by an alternate material. 
Shadows can only exsist by the unreaching of light. How could it be replaced when its essential and poetic meaning comes from nonexistence?

Hae Won Sohn

12. If you were to start a personal museum or collection, what would it contain?
I would have a collection of all the sweets that were able to make it in the final package without getting picked out as a flawed product.

Hae Won Sohn

10.Any man-made object that was designed so well that it had the sensitivity, balance, proportions, function or the poise of a living being?  
I do not think a scissor can be replaced by any other object. Not even a laser cut device nor a cutter. It is always pleasurable experience to be able to sense subtle touch and sounds while using a scissor when simply cutting a sheet of paper. This particular scissor is a picture I took when I was an undergraduate student in Kookmin University (Seoul, South Korea), while at a degree show of a metalsmithing graduate student.

Hae Won Sohn

8.Did you ever come across a nonobvious object? 

I was unsure in which context this brush-like object could be used in at first, but now I use this object almost daily. I do always get questions of what this is to friends who visit my space.

Hae Won Sohn

6.Object (s) whose structure or architecture is thought provoking or challenging for you?
The structure of this toilet came to me as a hybrid of a squatting toilet and a sitting toilet which are both commonly referred to as asian style toilet and western style toilet. I though it was a very ideal toilet where one can sit, and also the water would splash against to where one is standing. This toilet is located in one of the restrooms of the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam, Netherlands).

Hae Won Sohn

4.Any object that you deeply and intensely desire (d)? 
This is a drawing based on my memory of a kid-size Mini Mouse printed mug, of which I used to always drink milk. This cup was the official "Hae Won Cup" among my family. It became nothing special as I grew up, but again something special the moment it shattered on the floor as my friend accidentally dropped it. Even till now, I randomly think about that regretful moment quite often. I desire it more as I know there are countless replicas out in the world but none of them can replace the one I owned.

Hae Won Sohn

2.Any inert object you found to be physically or emotionally overpowering? 
Occasionally, I find objects that define space more interesting the art object that is under spot light in the same “space.” Showing is a photo of an architectural structure existing behind a lighting device shining focus to an artwork. The artwork was part of “documenta 14”, and photo was took in the summer of 2017 at Kassel, Germany.

Hae Won Sohn

1.Who is your oldest companion from the object world?  
Distributing/Receiving a towel is a thing in South Korea after hosting/participating in a community event. From the stitched text, I can guess my mother brought this left-over souvenir back home from a field day at an elementary school she worked before I was born. This towel is one of the oldest and frequently-touched object companion present in my life. I brought this towel with me as I moved to the States in 2016, and take it along with me everywhere I travel. I personally think new towels can never beat the function and texture of old ones.