Design

All That Glitters: The Artistic Furniture of Kang Myung Sun

Contemporary designer Kang Myung Sun (b. 1974 in Seoul, Korea) is steeped in the arts and craft traditions of her native Korea. Nacre lacquerware, marked by the use of inlaid mother-of-pearl and black lacquer to embellish furniture and decorative objects, dates back centuries. The time-honored craft has been used to create exquisite and intricate surface embellishments. Kang is among a new renaissance of artists who are embracing and reimagining the possibilities of the technique. "Old without the new and new without the old do not attract me as it only appeals to one or the other. But in between, it is limitless,” says Kang Myung Sun, who graduated from Hongik University in Korea with a PhD in Space Design and a BFA in woodworking and furniture design. Kang’s curvaceous forms are often described as “organic,” where she bends the mother-of-pearl to accommodate and accentuate her rounded forms. Kang stands among and alongside other prominent contemporary Korean designers breaking into today’s global design market with contemporary work that embraces and expands both aesthetic and material considerations.