Christine Sun Kim

Christine Sun Kim is not your everyday artist. Born deaf, Kim allows her unique perspective to help others strengthen their understanding of sound through sound art. As a sound artist, it is her job to display capture audible expressions in ways that the ear is not always needed for. To create her art Kim draws knowledge from aspect of deaf culture in her many performances, videos, and drawings. She also pulls inspiration from American Sign language (ASL), body language, music, and more.  

 One of her works, “The Sound of,” is a collection of drawings inspired by the movie “Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter.” This was a movie with little dialogue, but had very descriptive captions. After watching the movie, she became intrigued on how sound might be expressed through imagery. Within the series, the work “The Sound of Obsession,” is an example. The row of p within the drawing represents a soft quiet sound, in music known as piano. The closeness and repetition of the p’s represent the mind repeating the note nonstop. If you can imagine a thought that simply won’t leave you alone, whether it be a song lyric, or an anxiety that’s how it may look.