The pictorial world of Korean illustrator Jinhwa Jang is awash in gradient neons and bold blacks that seem to burst from the frame. In these illustrations, characters with deformed heads meander about, a backpack becomes a train carriage, and strange floating spheres appear at random against varying urban backdrops and geometric architecture. By themselves, these details may seem unconnected, but together, there’s a sense of accord.
Jinhwa Jang 的作品很跳跃，爆炸云形状的人头、列车头的书包，悬空各处的球体和随时会出现的白天鹅泳圈，加之荧光色与黑白色的撞击，画面丰富又毫无违和感。
Jang, who divides her time between Seoul and Shanghai, enjoys taking photos of the two cities, and she often bases her illustrations on these casual snapshots. The process begins with certain parts of these real-life captures being sketched out. She then begins sprinkling in outlandish details before finishing everything off with her signature neons. These trademark aesthetics even persist in her commercial works.
辗转于首尔和上海两地时，Jinhwa 拍下的日常生活中的照片，很多也成为了涂抹颜色的画板。将周遭环境重新融合，并通过霓虹般鲜亮的颜色重新点亮一座城市，是 Jinhwa 作品最大的特色。这种特色让她在许多商业合作项目上非常耀眼。
Jang’s commissioned projects have outpaced her personal works, but she isn’t bothered by it. “Alternating between personal and commercial projects is a nice change-up,” she says. “I’m not always inspired or productive, so when a commercial brief comes along, it can help usher in new ideas.”
In one instance when she was especially starved for ideas, a project for South Korean magazine TOYBOX came along. The brief was broad, simply instructing her to reimagine the cover of the 1907 Korean book adaptation of Jules Verne’s sci-fi novel The Begum’s Fortune. Riffing on the story’s dystopian setting and themes, her imagination ran free, culminating in a colorful illustration of an industrial cityscape populated by smokestacks, rocket ships, and bizarre plant life. The project felt especially rewarding to Jang, who saw it as a chance to tread outside of her creative comfort zone.
虽然在 Jinhwa 成为专职插画师后，许多委托项目纷至沓来，但这对她来说却并不是大问题。“在商业委托和个人工作之间交替工作真的帮助我回到节奏。” Jinhwa 说自己并不是时时刻刻都灵感爆棚或者高效运作的，很多时候她喜欢创作商业插画，这也给了她很多意想不到的帮助。“在最近的商业合作中，我最喜欢的是给韩国文学杂志《TOYBOX》创作的插画封面，客户给了我一个有趣的 brief：‘重新解读 1907 年出版的科幻小说《铁世界》（本书改编自 Jules Verne 的韩国小说《贝格姆的财富》）的封面，并加之以自己的理解。’”于是乎，Jinhwa Jang 画了一座揉杂了植物、烟雾和火箭的未来城市。书中对异想世界的描绘让她迸发出许多奇思妙想，Jinhwa 非常感谢有这样种种的合作，让她可以一次次挖掘到事物之间更深层次的关联，并拥有了付诸实践的可能。
Despite the number of commercial projects she continues to take on, Jang still strives to set time aside for personal projects. She’s endlessly experimenting with color combinations and looking for new imaginative spins to put to her snapshots. She has no plans to just stop there though; in fact, she’s expanding beyond illustrations and into comic art. A graphic novel drawn in her signature style is currently in the works. “It’s tough to make a physical comic book and get it published,” she says. “Hopefully I’ll be able to debut it at an art book fair this year!”
虽然工作不少，但 Jinhwa Jang 依然持续做着个人项目。这种对颜色的执着和对都市生活的再次创作的喜欢，是她源源不断的动力。但 Jinhwa 并没有打算止步于此，实际上她正在从插画扩展到漫画艺术，目前正在创作一本以她的风格绘制的漫画书。她说：“要完成一本漫画并出版，感觉太难了，但希望今年可以做完然后带到一个艺术书展上去！”
网站: www.jinhwajangart.com
Instagram: @jinhwajangart
Behance: ~/jinhwajangart
供稿人: Chen Yuan
