Sei Ryun Chun- Biography
Sei Ryun Chun is a contemporary Korean American artist and essayist who practices fluidly across painting, sculpture, installation, performance, writing, and digital media. She studied fine art at Konkuk University beginning in 1979, concentrating on sculpture and painting. After graduating, she taught art before immigrating to the United States in 1981. She continued her studies in etching at the New Milford Art Center and printmaking at New York University.
For more than forty-five years in the United States, Chun has developed an evolving practice grounded in Korean philosophy and reflection on nature, time, and invisible connections. Along with her work in the art world, Chun teaches Korean art and culture in her communities and hosts tea ceremonies and art lessons in libraries and schools. Sharing Korean culture with the younger generation has become a key part of her mission.
In 2003, she founded Oms Art Gallery and curated over 100 exhibitions in New York, Korea, Washington, D.C., and many other states on the East Coast. In addition, Chun has presented 27 solo exhibitions and has participated in major art fairs, including the Miami Art Fair and Fine Art Fair San Francisco. She also has performed traditional tea ceremonies to honor her Korean-American identity and share it. Through her work, Chun fosters attention to the unseen threads that bond individuals, cultures, and the natural world, creating a sustained meditation on invisible connections where ritual and material open pathways to mindfulness in an increasingly fragmented world.
For more than forty-five years in the United States, Chun has developed an evolving practice grounded in Korean philosophy and reflection on nature, time, and invisible connections. Along with her work in the art world, Chun teaches Korean art and culture in her communities and hosts tea ceremonies and art lessons in libraries and schools. Sharing Korean culture with the younger generation has become a key part of her mission.
In 2003, she founded Oms Art Gallery and curated over 100 exhibitions in New York, Korea, Washington, D.C., and many other states on the East Coast. In addition, Chun has presented 27 solo exhibitions and has participated in major art fairs, including the Miami Art Fair and Fine Art Fair San Francisco. She also has performed traditional tea ceremonies to honor her Korean-American identity and share it. Through her work, Chun fosters attention to the unseen threads that bond individuals, cultures, and the natural world, creating a sustained meditation on invisible connections where ritual and material open pathways to mindfulness in an increasingly fragmented world.
Sei Ryun Chun- Artist Statement
My work emerges from a continuous dialogue with nature, time, and invisible connections. My practice centers on the circle as an elemental form and is grounded in Asian philosophy and my experience as a Korean-American. Circles are echoes of the Milky Way, aurora, and the continuous cycles of life, a vision of both cosmic boundlessness and inner reflection.
I work with mixed media, including painting, sculpture, installation, and performance, using tea-dyed paper, leather, and thread, alongside my investigation of digital methods. The world we live in today is a place where physical presence and virtual spaces collide and blend. My recent work is an exploration of this convergence of analog and digital. Threads represent ubiquitous networks that transcend borders, bonding people across oceans and cultures into a shared whole.
For 30 years, performance has been an integral part of my practice. I dance with Asian black ink (muk) paintings on silk in mountains, seas, forests, and rivers around the world. In my performances, I dance to express my inner perception and what is sensed while in nature.
As a traditional Korean tea ceremony master, tea has always remained central to my work. Through ritual, fragrance, and mindful engagement of the five senses, I invite everyone to stillness, meditation, and reconnection with nature. In an increasingly digital age, my work explores the changing world and offers a space for calm, awareness, and deep relational understanding.
2025
Sei Ryun Chun is a multidisciplinary artist.
In 1981, she moved to America and continued her studies in painting, installations, ceramics, essay writing, performance, and conceptual art. In addition to writing extensively about the art of Korean identity, she shares this in educational settings and performs Traditional Korean Tea Ceremonies throughout the East Coast.
She has had 27 Solo exhibitions and curates exhibitions in New York, Korea, and Europe. Her exhibitions and presentations incorporate her mastery of the Traditional Korean Tea Ceremony.
She is inspired and influenced by the meditative nature of Korean tea culture.
Her mission is to share its unique beauty through art, tea ceremonies, and writing while educating about the similarities and differences it shares with other East Asian countries.
OM 2015
The exhibition was focused on the theme of the round sky and rectangular earth, which I was working on for a very long time. The Korean mythologies are expressed in the round circles. I bottled the Eastern cultures and philosophies in my art work, as I wrote down my own stories in my diary. The dream of Utopia, which exists in both the East and West, was shown as a man and a woman sitting in Zen meditation. The sun, the moon, and the countless stars are expressed with the circular tea-dyed leather.
Korean characters, “you and I” are shown in the installation of the rectangular canvases on the wall. I wanted to communicate with my audience, using the holy words of Buddha, coming out from the sky and the earth (ᄋ.ᄆ). Every morning before I start on my artwork, I meditate, and drink tea. I put the tea leaves on the paper and watch the traces of the tea-dye in different forms every day, and I let my artwork be in the flow of time.
The media I used for the artwork in this exhibition were mixed-media, tea-dyed Korean drum leather, which verbalizes the circles of the Eastern culture, and CDs weaved with fishing string to articulate the digital culture and online connections between people in the present.
I expressed the connection between people with threads, and installed the drum leathers to let the sound of om spread throughout the gallery. I created Korean letters with BeoSeon (Korean socks), thread and needles, which symbolize feminism in Korea, and expressed the fragrance of tea and the beauty of humanity with paper flowers.
!After teaching Korean Art and Culture to the Korean American students at the Korean School for twenty eight years, I realized that I learned so much from teaching the students. Art and culture overcome any difference between culture and age.
I made a promise with myself, just like I created artwork for this exhibition, I will keep on creating my life story for my future.
The Fragrance of Tea 2015
“Sei Ryun Chun’s work reminds me of meditation. It’s like seeing her everyday life in her works. They are like her journals of her daily life. Use of tea leaves and other materials from nature gives a very calm and at the same time strong effects of nature.”
Myron J. Lewis, President ! Board of Directors of Belskie Museum
Whenever I drink a cup of tea, I close my eyes and smell its fragrance. The fragrance makes me calm and gives me a natural energy. It allows me to meditate and concentrate on my art work. My mind becomes very clear and spiritual.
When I drink a tea, I also enjoy the loneliness. Even when
it’s windy...raining...sunny...flowers blooming...I drink a tea and
enjoy all of nature. The most important time is a tea time. As chinese character, tea means grass, people, and tree. Tea includes everything. It is universal. Tea is my philosophy.
Scent of Nostalgia 2010
For my artwork, I worked with a mixture of leather, paint, sand, shells and green tea.
Similar to when I worked on the ChoSun Women Series where I used the style of photo-etching on leather, I felt that the maternal love from the women was as soft as the buttery leather, where the unique personalities and perspectives of these women were shown.
After brewing some tea, I use the tea leaves and pour them on to paper, fabric and leather. I work with the traces of the tea leaves which display the flow of time, and this becomes my art. I incorporated the stars from the universe in my artwork, because I drink tea every day which cleanses my soul and I meditate to become one with nature.
The circle has no end and no beginning. The circle in essence keeps rotating endlessly and is eternal. Back in the day paper was only used as a canvas, ever since the beginning of human history up until the digital era of today. However, nowadays leather is used as well as paper as canvases. Countless dots represent time and tangled lines like a ball of thread complete a surface.
The heart of the microcosm within our body, which cannot even be touched or seen, was painted with abstract colors. Those billions of stars in the great universe were expressed by the installation on the wall as if we were able travel between them by a space shuttle.
I work with mixed media, including painting, sculpture, installation, and performance, using tea-dyed paper, leather, and thread, alongside my investigation of digital methods. The world we live in today is a place where physical presence and virtual spaces collide and blend. My recent work is an exploration of this convergence of analog and digital. Threads represent ubiquitous networks that transcend borders, bonding people across oceans and cultures into a shared whole.
For 30 years, performance has been an integral part of my practice. I dance with Asian black ink (muk) paintings on silk in mountains, seas, forests, and rivers around the world. In my performances, I dance to express my inner perception and what is sensed while in nature.
As a traditional Korean tea ceremony master, tea has always remained central to my work. Through ritual, fragrance, and mindful engagement of the five senses, I invite everyone to stillness, meditation, and reconnection with nature. In an increasingly digital age, my work explores the changing world and offers a space for calm, awareness, and deep relational understanding.
2025
Sei Ryun Chun is a multidisciplinary artist.
In 1981, she moved to America and continued her studies in painting, installations, ceramics, essay writing, performance, and conceptual art. In addition to writing extensively about the art of Korean identity, she shares this in educational settings and performs Traditional Korean Tea Ceremonies throughout the East Coast.
She has had 27 Solo exhibitions and curates exhibitions in New York, Korea, and Europe. Her exhibitions and presentations incorporate her mastery of the Traditional Korean Tea Ceremony.
She is inspired and influenced by the meditative nature of Korean tea culture.
Her mission is to share its unique beauty through art, tea ceremonies, and writing while educating about the similarities and differences it shares with other East Asian countries.
OM 2015
The exhibition was focused on the theme of the round sky and rectangular earth, which I was working on for a very long time. The Korean mythologies are expressed in the round circles. I bottled the Eastern cultures and philosophies in my art work, as I wrote down my own stories in my diary. The dream of Utopia, which exists in both the East and West, was shown as a man and a woman sitting in Zen meditation. The sun, the moon, and the countless stars are expressed with the circular tea-dyed leather.
Korean characters, “you and I” are shown in the installation of the rectangular canvases on the wall. I wanted to communicate with my audience, using the holy words of Buddha, coming out from the sky and the earth (ᄋ.ᄆ). Every morning before I start on my artwork, I meditate, and drink tea. I put the tea leaves on the paper and watch the traces of the tea-dye in different forms every day, and I let my artwork be in the flow of time.
The media I used for the artwork in this exhibition were mixed-media, tea-dyed Korean drum leather, which verbalizes the circles of the Eastern culture, and CDs weaved with fishing string to articulate the digital culture and online connections between people in the present.
I expressed the connection between people with threads, and installed the drum leathers to let the sound of om spread throughout the gallery. I created Korean letters with BeoSeon (Korean socks), thread and needles, which symbolize feminism in Korea, and expressed the fragrance of tea and the beauty of humanity with paper flowers.
!After teaching Korean Art and Culture to the Korean American students at the Korean School for twenty eight years, I realized that I learned so much from teaching the students. Art and culture overcome any difference between culture and age.
I made a promise with myself, just like I created artwork for this exhibition, I will keep on creating my life story for my future.
The Fragrance of Tea 2015
“Sei Ryun Chun’s work reminds me of meditation. It’s like seeing her everyday life in her works. They are like her journals of her daily life. Use of tea leaves and other materials from nature gives a very calm and at the same time strong effects of nature.”
Myron J. Lewis, President ! Board of Directors of Belskie Museum
Whenever I drink a cup of tea, I close my eyes and smell its fragrance. The fragrance makes me calm and gives me a natural energy. It allows me to meditate and concentrate on my art work. My mind becomes very clear and spiritual.
When I drink a tea, I also enjoy the loneliness. Even when
it’s windy...raining...sunny...flowers blooming...I drink a tea and
enjoy all of nature. The most important time is a tea time. As chinese character, tea means grass, people, and tree. Tea includes everything. It is universal. Tea is my philosophy.
Scent of Nostalgia 2010
For my artwork, I worked with a mixture of leather, paint, sand, shells and green tea.
Similar to when I worked on the ChoSun Women Series where I used the style of photo-etching on leather, I felt that the maternal love from the women was as soft as the buttery leather, where the unique personalities and perspectives of these women were shown.
After brewing some tea, I use the tea leaves and pour them on to paper, fabric and leather. I work with the traces of the tea leaves which display the flow of time, and this becomes my art. I incorporated the stars from the universe in my artwork, because I drink tea every day which cleanses my soul and I meditate to become one with nature.
The circle has no end and no beginning. The circle in essence keeps rotating endlessly and is eternal. Back in the day paper was only used as a canvas, ever since the beginning of human history up until the digital era of today. However, nowadays leather is used as well as paper as canvases. Countless dots represent time and tangled lines like a ball of thread complete a surface.
The heart of the microcosm within our body, which cannot even be touched or seen, was painted with abstract colors. Those billions of stars in the great universe were expressed by the installation on the wall as if we were able travel between them by a space shuttle.
Sei Ryun Chun- Resume
Education
1990 Studied at New York University - Printmaking Graduate Courses
1986 Art Center of Northern New Jersey
1975 BFA Kun-Kook University , Art & Design
Teaching Experiences
1982- Present Hoonmin Korean School of Art and Culture
Solo Exhibitions
2024 Octagon, Bona Gallery, Daegu, Korea
2022 Without Beginning Without End, Gamrosa, AZ
2021 CAMINO, Gala Art Center, NY
2021 Catskills Story (Without Beginning Without End), KCC Gallery, NJ
2020 Catskills Story, Davin Fine Art Gallery, NY
2019 OMNE, MK Gallery, VA, Washington D.C.
2018 Ubiquitous, City of Brockton Public Library, MA
2018 Rounded, Islip Art Museum, NY
2017 Art is Filling, Berlin, Germany
2017 Eternal, Bank of Hope, New York, NY
2017 Ubiquitous, Seward Park Library, New York, NY
2016 Ubiquitous, Suwon Art Center, Seoul, Korea
2016 Mutation, Piermont Public Library Gallery, NY
2015 Ubiquitous, Bergen Performing Art Center, NJ
2014 Milky Way, Sesimje Gallery, Jeju, Korea
2013 Fragrance of Tea, Gallery of Korean Cultural Center, Washington DC
2012 Meditation, Oms Art Gallery, Fort Lee, NJ
2011 OM, Long Island University Hutchins Gallery, NY
2010 The Sylvia Wald and Po Kim Gallery, NY
2010 Hommage Soo Keun, Chelsea West Gallery, New York, NY
2003 Bank Asiana Gallery Oms Public Art, NY
2001 Beautiful Organization Exhibition, Seoul, Korea
2 Person Show
2017 Destiny, Wuppertal, Germany
4 Person Show
2012 4-person show, Chun Gallery, NY
2011 JPEG04, Da Gallery, New York, NY
2010 The Sylvia Wald and Pho Kim Gallery, 4-person Exhibition, NY
Special Curated Exhibitions
2018 Seoul 2 NY, Seoul, Korea
2023 Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2024 Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2025, Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2025 Jeju 2 NY, Jeju Island, Korea
Group Exhibitions
2025 Gala Art Center, NY
2024 69th Exhibition of Creative Art Association, Seoul Art Center Korean
2022 Open Spring Festival & Zen Art Show, Baklimsa Catskill Zendo, NY
2019 NY 2 Seoul, La:ppland, Seoul, Korea
2018 Parthibition, Space Ciel Gallery, Pompton Lakes, NJ
2017 Celebrating Small, Darvin Fine Art Gallery, Piermont, NY
2017 Envisioning Habitats, Flushing, Queens, NY
2017 Dynamic Dimensions, Belskie Museum of Art and Science, Closter, NJ
2014 Double Mirror, American University Museum, Washington DC
2014 59th Exhibition of ChangJark Fine Association, Sejong Center Galery, Seoul, Korea
2014 BBCN Bank, Flushing, NY
2014 Shades of Time, The Archive of Korean American Artists, Queens Museum, NY
2014 Shades of Time, Cultural Service Gallery Korea, NY
2014 Sobab Gallery 3 person show, Seoul, Korea
2013 Gallery of Korean Cultural Center, NY (4 artists)
2012 Maum Gallery, New York, NY
2011 White Lab Gallery, Milano, Italy
2011 Gallery OMS, SF Art Fair, SF
2010 OMS Gallery Miami Art Fair
2010 KCC Gallery, NJ
2000 Korean Art Group Exhibition in Culture Center, Paris
Grants and Awards
2014 30 Years Certificate of Teaching in Korean School
2010 AHL Foundation Community Award
2001 Holy Name Best Artist Award, Belskie Museum Closter, NJ
1998 Art Center New Milford Mixed Media Award
1990 Printmaking Award in NJ Women's Art Association
Lectures
2014 Seoul Korea Chungbuk University Art and Culture
2013 National American Korea School, Art and Culture Seminar
Art in Public Place
Gayeon, Fort Lee, NJ
Bank of Hope, Palisades Park, NJ
Private Collection (excluded)
Review
2016 TV Channel KBN, About Artist Sei Ryun Chun
2016 TV Channel TKC, Artist Sei Ryun Chun Studio Interview
2016 Seoul Korea Art and Culture Newspaper
2015 Art Forum Magazine, Seoul Korea
2014 Seoul Korea Gyeonggi Daily News
2010 New York Korean Times, Artist Sei Ryun Chun
2008 New York Central Daily News, New York Artist Sei Ryun Chun
Performance (Korean Traditional Tea Performance)
2022 Tea Ceremony at Korea in Philly, Philadelphia, PA
2019 OMNE, MK Gallery, VA, Washinton D.C.
2018 Korean Thanksgiving Festival in U.S. Botanic Garden, D.C.
2018 Art Space |Aa at Jeju, Korea
2018 Tea Ceremony in Islip Art Museum, NY
2017 Tea Ceremony in Queens Library; Bayside, Woodside, Flushing, East Flushing
2017 Wuppertal, Germany, Destiny Tea Ceremony
2017 Berlin, Germany, Art if Filling Tea Ceremony
2016 Washington DC Smithsonian Tea Ceremony
2015 FIT Korea Traditional Tea Ceremony
2000 NYU, Cornell, Boston, and Yale Traditional Tea Ceremony
Essay - Korean Times
Life and Art Columnist
Museum
2016 Suwon Museum of Art Center
1990 Studied at New York University - Printmaking Graduate Courses
1986 Art Center of Northern New Jersey
1975 BFA Kun-Kook University , Art & Design
Teaching Experiences
1982- Present Hoonmin Korean School of Art and Culture
Solo Exhibitions
2024 Octagon, Bona Gallery, Daegu, Korea
2022 Without Beginning Without End, Gamrosa, AZ
2021 CAMINO, Gala Art Center, NY
2021 Catskills Story (Without Beginning Without End), KCC Gallery, NJ
2020 Catskills Story, Davin Fine Art Gallery, NY
2019 OMNE, MK Gallery, VA, Washington D.C.
2018 Ubiquitous, City of Brockton Public Library, MA
2018 Rounded, Islip Art Museum, NY
2017 Art is Filling, Berlin, Germany
2017 Eternal, Bank of Hope, New York, NY
2017 Ubiquitous, Seward Park Library, New York, NY
2016 Ubiquitous, Suwon Art Center, Seoul, Korea
2016 Mutation, Piermont Public Library Gallery, NY
2015 Ubiquitous, Bergen Performing Art Center, NJ
2014 Milky Way, Sesimje Gallery, Jeju, Korea
2013 Fragrance of Tea, Gallery of Korean Cultural Center, Washington DC
2012 Meditation, Oms Art Gallery, Fort Lee, NJ
2011 OM, Long Island University Hutchins Gallery, NY
2010 The Sylvia Wald and Po Kim Gallery, NY
2010 Hommage Soo Keun, Chelsea West Gallery, New York, NY
2003 Bank Asiana Gallery Oms Public Art, NY
2001 Beautiful Organization Exhibition, Seoul, Korea
2 Person Show
2017 Destiny, Wuppertal, Germany
4 Person Show
2012 4-person show, Chun Gallery, NY
2011 JPEG04, Da Gallery, New York, NY
2010 The Sylvia Wald and Pho Kim Gallery, 4-person Exhibition, NY
Special Curated Exhibitions
2018 Seoul 2 NY, Seoul, Korea
2023 Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2024 Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2025, Zen Art Show, White Forest Gallery, Catskills, NY
2025 Jeju 2 NY, Jeju Island, Korea
Group Exhibitions
2025 Gala Art Center, NY
2024 69th Exhibition of Creative Art Association, Seoul Art Center Korean
2022 Open Spring Festival & Zen Art Show, Baklimsa Catskill Zendo, NY
2019 NY 2 Seoul, La:ppland, Seoul, Korea
2018 Parthibition, Space Ciel Gallery, Pompton Lakes, NJ
2017 Celebrating Small, Darvin Fine Art Gallery, Piermont, NY
2017 Envisioning Habitats, Flushing, Queens, NY
2017 Dynamic Dimensions, Belskie Museum of Art and Science, Closter, NJ
2014 Double Mirror, American University Museum, Washington DC
2014 59th Exhibition of ChangJark Fine Association, Sejong Center Galery, Seoul, Korea
2014 BBCN Bank, Flushing, NY
2014 Shades of Time, The Archive of Korean American Artists, Queens Museum, NY
2014 Shades of Time, Cultural Service Gallery Korea, NY
2014 Sobab Gallery 3 person show, Seoul, Korea
2013 Gallery of Korean Cultural Center, NY (4 artists)
2012 Maum Gallery, New York, NY
2011 White Lab Gallery, Milano, Italy
2011 Gallery OMS, SF Art Fair, SF
2010 OMS Gallery Miami Art Fair
2010 KCC Gallery, NJ
2000 Korean Art Group Exhibition in Culture Center, Paris
Grants and Awards
2014 30 Years Certificate of Teaching in Korean School
2010 AHL Foundation Community Award
2001 Holy Name Best Artist Award, Belskie Museum Closter, NJ
1998 Art Center New Milford Mixed Media Award
1990 Printmaking Award in NJ Women's Art Association
Lectures
2014 Seoul Korea Chungbuk University Art and Culture
2013 National American Korea School, Art and Culture Seminar
Art in Public Place
Gayeon, Fort Lee, NJ
Bank of Hope, Palisades Park, NJ
Private Collection (excluded)
Review
2016 TV Channel KBN, About Artist Sei Ryun Chun
2016 TV Channel TKC, Artist Sei Ryun Chun Studio Interview
2016 Seoul Korea Art and Culture Newspaper
2015 Art Forum Magazine, Seoul Korea
2014 Seoul Korea Gyeonggi Daily News
2010 New York Korean Times, Artist Sei Ryun Chun
2008 New York Central Daily News, New York Artist Sei Ryun Chun
Performance (Korean Traditional Tea Performance)
2022 Tea Ceremony at Korea in Philly, Philadelphia, PA
2019 OMNE, MK Gallery, VA, Washinton D.C.
2018 Korean Thanksgiving Festival in U.S. Botanic Garden, D.C.
2018 Art Space |Aa at Jeju, Korea
2018 Tea Ceremony in Islip Art Museum, NY
2017 Tea Ceremony in Queens Library; Bayside, Woodside, Flushing, East Flushing
2017 Wuppertal, Germany, Destiny Tea Ceremony
2017 Berlin, Germany, Art if Filling Tea Ceremony
2016 Washington DC Smithsonian Tea Ceremony
2015 FIT Korea Traditional Tea Ceremony
2000 NYU, Cornell, Boston, and Yale Traditional Tea Ceremony
Essay - Korean Times
Life and Art Columnist
Museum
2016 Suwon Museum of Art Center
