‘My artwork training was rooted within the conventional and the technical – how to attract the determine in an anatomically right method is so ingrained in me,’ says Anna Park. ‘It took me a very long time to combat in opposition to that, but it surely has helped me a lot, as a result of understanding that has allowed me to interrupt the principles.’
Park has loved making her personal guidelines in her large-scale, hard-to-define works. Half summary, half figurative, her charcoal and ink drawings slyly poke enjoyable at conference in each their model and their content material.
It’s a huge second for Park, who’s getting ready for her first main retrospective at Lehmann Maupin in London since becoming a member of the gallery final yr. Born in Daegu, South Korea, Park moved round quite a bit as a toddler, to New Zealand and California earlier than spending eight years in Utah, the place she started to develop her creative id earlier than heading to New York, the place she attended artwork college. ‘My mother and father, who’re each pharmacists, made so many sacrifices to maneuver us to America and begin a brand new life. My mom allowed me to have the alternatives she by no means had rising up.’
New, as but untitled, artworks in charcoal, ink and paint for Park’s London present
(Picture credit score: Artworks courtesy of the artist and Lehmann Maupin, New York, Seoul, and London)
Spending her youth in Utah positioned Park as one thing of an outsider wanting in, a voyeuristic undertone that runs all through her work. Fragments of this narrative, interspersed all through summary swirls, unite an eclectic prism of references, from comedian books to classic pin-ups.
‘Plenty of the references come from previous comics – they’re the place my love for drawing got here from. It additionally comes from continually consuming media and fascinating with imagery on-line. We’re inundated with it on a regular basis. I benefit from the aesthetic qualities of classic comics, or the way in which that the feminine determine is portrayed, as a result of it is vitally old-school Barbie-like, with an exaggerated female kind. There’s little or no nuance – girls are both vivacious blondes or vixens. However both method, you continue to must be scorching and attractive, and serve the male gaze.’
In her upcoming present ‘Scorching Honey’, Park intertwines these inspirations with a bigger consideration of the function of the feminine protagonist, in the end selecting to unite the 2 female stereotypes collectively in opposition in opposition to their male counterparts. Within the summary tableaux, we spot acquainted symbols – bunny ears, high hats – which beckon us behind the scenes of the magic exhibits that Park creates in her work. Taken out of context, these splashy equipment of the magician’s assistant develop into infused with a brand new context. As soon as disjointed, this femininity is difficult to position.
‘These pin-up ladies will not be reflective of the on a regular basis lady, however I need to place them in these cheeky moments the place they’re pointing the enjoyable at themselves’
Anna Park
‘I really like the summary, extra gestural, phonetic drawing model,’ Park provides. ‘However then I additionally love these tight moments of actually fantastic, cartoon or comedian book-like illustrations or work. So it was me simply being very grasping and saying I need to have each. In some works, there are these vignettes, or home windows, which additionally carry a textural factor. They’re virtually an introduction to my inside ideas, among the many chaotic foreground. It is my method of collaging, or injecting these ideas which inform one another all through the entire image.’
Element of Anna Park’s Maintain That Thought, 2026
(Picture credit score: Duncan Wright for Artwork Gallery of Western Australia)
Park’s tone is playful, satirical, usually humorous. The understanding grins of her figures present that they’re in on the joke, conscious of their function in difficult magnificence requirements. ‘Having moved round a lot as a little bit child, your senses are heightened and you’re conscious of how totally different you’re, particularly in Utah, the place I used to be one in every of only a few Asian children in class,’ she says. ‘You develop into conscious of various magnificence requirements. As a lady, you are continually conscious of your self. I believe each younger woman and lady has that confrontation in numerous methods.’
Park is not deliberately externalising this in her works. But, by pulling references from an eclectic vary of sources, together with retro pin-up ladies, she is difficult a extra standard narrative. ‘These pin-up ladies will not be reflective of the on a regular basis lady, however I need to place them in these cheeky moments the place they’re pointing the enjoyable at themselves. It’s subverting the narrative of what’s very glamorous; the journal pictures with these excellent, unattainable girls. I need to place these girls in order that they’re laughing at themselves, too. They do appear lovely, however then I place them in scenes the place they could possibly be doing one thing actually goofy, or in additional actual moments. I discover that twinge of humour in it, and it is not taking itself so severely.’
‘Scorching Honey’ will likely be on present from 30 April-30 Could at Lehmann Maupin, London W1
This text seems within the Could 2026 Milan Preview Situation of Wallpaper*, out there in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple Information +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* at the moment
