SungEun Park

Focus and Philosophy: Sung Eun Park is a foundation coordinator and faculty member in the 3D/sculpture concentration of the Art Department. While teaching foundational courses, she helps students develop not only basic knowledge and skills but also the mindset and work ethic necessary to truly pursue their goals and the paths they want to follow. Sung Eun Park believes that this foundation facilitates continuous exploration and consistent practice, both in the artist’s creative journey and in their personal growth. Her teaching focuses on guiding students to cultivate curiosity, perseverance, and a sustained passion for creation.

Background: Sung Eun Park has always pursued life as an artist, and through reflection on her own learning experiences, she naturally found her path expanding into education. Her work with students has revealed the deep connection between art and learning. Park’s teaching philosophy is founded on the belief that the processes of creating art and learning share the same core principles: continuous exploration, awareness, and growth. Through her teaching, she endeavors to help students discover their own artistic identities while continuing her own journey as an active, practicing artist.

Teaching: Sung Eun Park has developed a personalized approach to mentoring students from diverse backgrounds, viewing art education as a structured learning process that extends beyond the mere expression of creativity or acquisition of technical skills. Accordingly, she regards art education as playing a crucial role in fostering persistent practice, critical thinking, and problem-solving, enabling students to connect artistic processes with their own fields of study.

Her experience as a multicultural educator has deepened her understanding of the importance of diversity and individuality, which she considers essential to both art education and effective pedagogy. She strives to create a learning environment in which students can explore a variety of media, systematically develop their technical skills, and establish their own distinctive creative identities. Through this approach, Park guides students toward achieving both academic success and artistic growth.

Research, Scholarship, and Creative Work: Sung Eun Park’s work investigates the complex relationship between life and death, with a particular focus on human attitudes toward mortality, funeral practices, and postmortem traditions. The COVID-19 pandemic intensified these reflections, raising critical questions about what constitutes a “good death.” Through installations that integrate everyday objects with carefully crafted elements, Park seeks to blur the boundaries between the familiar and the surreal, inviting viewers to confront the reality of death while fostering acceptance and a deeper contemplation of life.

Her work has been exhibited at galleries including Vox Populi, the Wassaic Summer Exhibition, Carnation Contemporary, the Vestibule, and CICA Museum. She is a former member of the Portland-based collective Well Well Projects and has participated in artist residencies at the Studios at Wassaic Project, Sitka Center for Art & Ecology, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Mass MoCA, and others.

For more information about SungEun Park, please open the tabs below. If you would like a digital copy of her complete CV, please contact her at separk@radford.edu.