Queens Artist Has His Eye On You
By Michael Lanza

When Eung Ho Park watched the L.A. riots unfold on television in 1992, something awoke in him.

"I began to realize as an Asian American artist that I had to figure out where I stand," Park said.

Eung Ho Park is a featured artist at the Y Gallery in Jackson Heights.

For the Korean born Jackson Heights resident and former textile designer, the event summed up years of racial frustration he had experienced first hand growing up in Oregon.

"Racial issues were something that's not talked about," Park said. "The L.A. riots gave me a voice. To create a conversation - that was really important to me at the time, it still is."

Park made his debut that year with an installation in Portland, Ore., "Let's Talk Pillow Talk," a juxtaposition of pop culture and social commentary influenced by the riots.

And although his work since hasn't taken the immediacy and reactionary character of his piece on the riots, Park's provocative installations still carry the weight of that first realization that his work could inspire discussion and open minds.

And that provocative nature has put the art community on notice. Since 2000 Park has been featured in five solo exhibits and 36 group exhibits across the country. It also garnered him a 2008 grant selection from the Queens Council on the Arts that will include an exhibit at Capital One Bank.

I’m Looking at You - 2006, painted bottle caps, epoxy resin, 62x105 inches.

Park's tapestries of common found objects like spoons, bowling balls and bottle caps, literally bent, shaped and reborn into new contexts, have given him the means to spark debate about the human condition and our social environment, he said.

"What you see on the street is evidence of our social condition at this moment," Park said. "I install the artwork in such a way that people start to ask questions. There's no room for escape - it's almost suffocating - you have to deal with the issues."

In Parks' 2006 piece, "I'm Looking at You," he used hundreds of common bottle caps painted over with retinal patterns to create a wall of artificial eyes, demanding the viewers attention in a not-so-subtle way and forcing them to think about the odd juxtaposition of subject and materials.

He plans to expand the idea this year for his Queens Council on the Arts Capital One Bank exhibit beginning Sept. 11 at 82nd Street and 37th Avenue. The exhibit will feature a window installation of nearly 1,000 bottle cap eyes.

Park will host a free bottle cap eye worshop during the Jackson Heights Film and Rood Festival on Sept. 13.

Despite the immediacy of his images and symbols and the larger-than-life scale of his installations, Park said he has developed a more subtle approach to how his viewers should interpret his work.

"I'm not trying to demand anything," Park said. "I'm not trying to provoke anyone. I'm satisfied if they can just ask why this artist is doing what he's doing."

But Park remains humble and committed to his community despite his recent success.

He will teach a free bottle cap eyes workshop at the Jackson Heights Film & Food Festival on Sept. 13 from noon to 4 p.m. at the Jackson Heights Garden School Courtyard.

"I don't have a grandiose goal." Park said. "I just want to make art. That's my goal. Art has a meaning to me. I just (want to) create a dialogue."

For more information on Park's work, visit www.ygallerynewyork.com.