Local StoriesSeptember 29, 2022

Life & Work with Hannah JH Bang

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Hannah JH Bang.

Hannah, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Hello , I am Hannah JH Bang, who is currently moved to Atlanta. I had an experience of living in Atlanta when I was a freshman at SCAD in 2019. I love to start living in Atlanta again. I am now in my senior year at Savannah College of Art and Design. I am studying Painting major and Fiber as a minor. I will graduate in March 2023. I just finished my Summer quarter SCAD in Lacoste, France. It was a lovely time.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?

Life includes a smooth way and also challenging events.

Christianity and art are the roots of my life.

I live in Atlanta, GA, the United States, and sometimes other countries, all as a foreigner except in South Korea, where I was born and raised. It is not easy to live in different spaces all around. How can I survive and maintain my life as well?

However, I believe in God, so I think all is from God’s gift. All single moments are a gift in my life, such as the time of making artwork, moving emotions, in a Christian community, with friends, and just being myself, praying, singing, and reading the Bible. Mainly, in Savannah, where I lived for almost two years, Independent Presbyterian Church, call as IPC in downtown Savannah, helped me fit in the feeling of belonging. That is the magical moment of loving based on the same belief.

My favorite sentence in the world is Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” I always wrote a note and attached it to the wall the first time I set up the space, such as an art studio, a room, and a car. The reason why I love this sentence is the beginning of the Bible, and also it shows everything created by God.

Belief gives me the ability to self-recognize the situation and appreciates it. Not only that but also faith gives me the confidence to live a life.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
In 2022, I felt like I was missing something in my life and couldn’t pinpoint what that feeling was. I didn’t know if it stemmed from my home, family, desire to settle down, etc. I asked myself those questions, which led to the self-reflecting inquiry of “why don’t I want to marry myself as an art performance?” I then decided to do that as a performance.

I had my wedding performance in this Space-Wedding project, but instead of marrying someone. I married myself as the performance. This series of artwork will showcase two different versions of Hannah.

One is Green Hannah. She was wearing a formal white wedding dress to embrace the role. Her elegant wedding pictures were taken in a famous location as the wedding photo; Forsyth Park photo by artist Kelly Dunham.

The other is Just Hannah, who represents me now.

Just Hannah will be using elements of my artwork in her wedding dress to create a more personalized feature for the film. Her wedding dress resemble a spacesuit. I had my painting entitled Space printed on fabric and on the fabric and made a jumpsuit in collaboration with designer Bonnie Chan. Just Hannah’s wedding video and pictures were shot rigidly with survival in mind, rather than a traditionally elegant wedding video.

The original painting Space is from a series of re-composition. Re-composition is a digital collage of unfinished paintings. The re-composition technique is the foundation of my art series. I compose visual elements in both digital and physical ways.

Why do I choose the elements “space,” “swimming,” and “wedding” together in the “Space-Wedding” project? That reason is the three things I love, but I do not know precisely how to do them. I can not swim, and I do not know how I can go to space as accurately. I also want to do a wedding, but I do not know how to do it now.

Do you have any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
Thank you for asking this question! It reminds my happy childhood a lot!

I want to talk about “bathroom: bath.”

My artwork “Infinity Bath” (2016) is about my childhood.

When I was young, sometimes I wanted to be alone, but adults such as parents and teachers usually did not allow me to be solitary except in the bathroom. So, I use that feature when I want to have my own space alone. I said, “I want to go to the restroom,” people gave me around 10 minutes of freedom without any people. That time was all my gift of kid life. So, I still enjoyed being alone and taking a bath in silence. When I was in the water, I felt a full hug even if the air could not interrupt. I love that hug from nature.

Art is also a gift in my life, also making dreams real my whole life.

I made an Infinity bath that includes a circulation water circulation pump motor. I installed that “Infinity Bath” on the rooftop. The water kept falling into the bath, and I was in there as a performance.

Contact Info:

Website: www.hannahbang.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hb4god/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1QqFHnwJlfMUygQr4oUQGA
Other: https://www.linco.app/hb4god

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