Mina Cheon (1973)

Korean American new media artist, scholar, and educator. At times appearing as a North Korean social realist painter Kim Il Soon, artist Mina Cheon advocates for global peace and Korean unification as a social activist political pop artist. Cheon's "POLIPOP: Political Pop Art" has been exhibited internationally, which includes painting, new media art, interactive media, installation art, and performance art work. One of Cheon's educational contributions has been the international art program and exchange that she has led with architect Gabriel Kroiz, and between American and Korean art, architecture, and design students. She has directed international art education since 2004, working with universities in Seoul such as Hongik University, Korea National University of Arts, and with Ewha Womans University in 2010, taking students from Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) and Morgan State University to South Korea. Ms. Cheon expanded her teaching horizons from just art to teaching in the departments of Foundation; Art History; Language, Literature, and Culture; and Interactive Media. She was also the founder and director of the summer study abroad program MICA Korea that was held each summer in Seoul, Korea between 2004-7. She once said that her favorite quote is that coined by Avital Ronell, Professor of German, Comparative Literature and English at New York University, and a Consulting Editor for Interlitq: “I am stupid before the other”. "I think that who you are is about what you do." "Fake news is real. It exists all around us, taking over our cultural psyche while devising communication in the political sphere. Fake news is influencing separatist worldviews, enforcing populist opinion and erasing cultural empowerment (and endowment), and burdening basic human rights, equality, and freedom of speech."