Seung-eon Yi is a filmmaker working with animation collaged media, based in Seoul.
Her work draws upon memories and the lingering sensations of experiences from her everyday life. Through animation, she revisits these memories, attempting to unearth their traces and the textures of remembrance. Using hand-crafted animation and painterly expressions, she conveys the abstract aspects of memory and emotion in a more intuitive and sensory manner. In doing so, she connects the deeply personal memories within her work to the audience, expanding them into new narratives and chapters.
She focuses on the often-overlooked, small things we unconsciously interact with and build relationships with through physical experience in our daily lives. In a society inundated with processed images, she sees how we live amid fleeting stimuli that are quickly consumed and discarded.
This era of ephemeral virtual experiences and superficial emotions, she believes, has led her to question the nature of "truth," drawing her attention to the intimate emotions and memories accumulated through physical experiences. Unlike "truth" as a collective agreement, the personal, unique truth one feels, she finds, is difficult to define but possesses an enduring, ambiguous quality that resists being forgotten. She explores what sustains an individual’s sense of existence, uncovering tentative answers in the memories formed through everyday life.
Her animated films invite viewers to reflect on what remains as "truth" in our memories, even amidst the constant changes of the external world and our struggles to adapt to them. It offers an opportunity to contemplate these truths and guides the audience into a sensory meditation, encouraging them to reflect on the ephemeral yet profound essence of their own lived experiences.
->seungyi95@gmail.com
->syi7@saic.edu
->Instagram
Other Works
CV
EDUCATION
2022 MFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, USA (Major: Film, Video, New Media, and Animation)
2019 BFA, Hongik University, Seoul, Korea (Major: Painting)
PROJECT LIST
2024 Dialogue : The Arriving and Vanishing, 9min 25sec, 2D hand-drawn animation
2021 푸른, (A Place in blue) 8min 40sec, 2D hand-drawn animation
2020 Perhaps by depravity he actually meant tenderness 4min, experimental animation
2019 A Story on the toilet 2min 11sec, experimental animation
SCREENINGS
2024 50th Seoul Independent Film Festival, Seoul, Korea
2024 20th Seou-Indie Anifest, Seoul, Korea
2023 Bucheon International Animation Festival, Bucheon, Korea
2023 Animac 2023, Lleida, Spain
2023 TRICKY WOMEN/TRICKY REALITIES 2023, Vienna, Austria
2022 29th International Film Festival Etiuda & Anima, Kraków, Poland
2022 23th San Diego Asian Film Festival, San Diego, USA
2022 20th Tirana International Film Festival, Tirana, Albania
2022 6th Festival of Animation Berlin, Berlin, Germany
2022 Seoul Indie-Anifest, Seoul, Korea
2022 25th Maine International Film Festival, Maine, USA
2022
2022 International Animated FIlm Festival Animator, Poznań, Poland
2022 La Guarimba International Film Festival, Calabria, Italy
2022 17th Athens Animfest, Athens, Greece
2022 11th American Documentary and Animation Film Festival, Palm Spring, USA
2020 Indie-AniFest 2020, Seoul, Korea
EXHIBITION
2025 Art Is (International group exhibition), CICA Museum, Gimpo, Korea (forthcoming)
RESIDENCY
2025 Saruya Air Artist Residency, Japan (forthcoming)
2023 Virginia Center for the Creative Arts Residency,Virginia, USA
2022 Monson Arts Residency, Maine, USA
2022 NES Residency, Skagaströnd, Iceland
AWARD
2023 Korean Film Archive (Kofa) selection
2023 Tricky Women Tricky Realities Jury Speical Mention
2023 Glas Animation Grant
2022 Bucheon International Animation Festival Grant
2023 Virginia Center for the Creative Arts 50th Anniversary Fellowship Award
2022 Monson Arts Residency Award
2022 Student Leadership Award, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2020-2022 New Artist Society Scholarship : The scholarship includes full tuition-and-fee coverage throughout the years in the MFA program , School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2014-2018 University Distinguished Scholarship A : endowed to the first-ranked student of the College of Fine Arts in Hongik University at the college admission, Hongik University
PUBLICATION
2023 SBS Ani Gallery director interview
(https://programs.sbs.co.kr/culture/anigallery/vod/52668/22000505417)
2023 A Place in Blue film review on Animación para adultos
(https://animacionparaadultos.es/2021-a-place-in-blue/)
EXPERIENCE
2024-present Sogang University, Seoul, Lecturer
2024-present Inha University, Incheon, Lecturer
2023-present Hongik University, Sejong, Lecturer
2022 Graduate Talk Lecture, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2021- 2022 KGSC (Korean Graduate Student Community) group leader, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2022 Teaching Assistant in Writing/Direction for animation, School of the Art institute of Chicago
2021 Teaching Assistant in Puppet Animation, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2021 Teaching Assistant in Media Practice : The Moving Image, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2020 Teaching Assistant in Animation 1: Drawing for Animation, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
COMMISSIONS
2023 Disney + Original documentary series <The Lost Boys> Animation director
2019 Book cover illustrator for Introduction to Static Analysis, Xavier Rival and Kwangkeun Yi, MIT Press (2020), ISBN 9780262043410
2015 Illustration Works for Computational Civilizations (컴퓨터 과학이 여는 세계), Kwangkeun Yi (이광근), Insight Book (2015), ISBN 9788966261437