Statement & Bio

  • I use my work to process and examine the emotional impact of specific events and experiences, transforming personal narratives into forms that invite connection and reflection. I believe one of the most compelling spaces in contemporary image-making lies at the intersection of digital techniques and hand-worked processes, where unique objects can emerge from the dialogue between technology and touch. I often employ beauty as a conceit, drawing viewers toward difficult truths and hidden realities they might otherwise overlook.

    I work across multiple media and believe that materials possess mana. Whenever possible, I choose the medium best suited to the conceptual and emotional needs of a project. While the resulting works may differ significantly in appearance, they are united by recurring concerns with memory, identity, loss, transformation, and the relationship between process and meaning. For me, process is never separate from content; it is an integral part of the work's statement and significance.

    Every warrior has a weapon. Art is mine.

  • Diana Nicholette Jeon is a contemporary conceptual and lens-based artist based in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, whose internationally exhibited work transforms personal experience into broader explorations of memory, identity, femininity, loss, and contemporary culture. Jeon believes media has mana and often employs it to underscore the conceptual foundations of a series. While most projects originate with a lens-based image, she frequently combines photographic, digital, and handmade processes to create works that move beyond conventional photography.

    Before pursuing art full-time, Jeon spent a decade working in the technology sector. She earned a BA in Studio Art from the University of Hawaiʻi and an MFA in Imaging and Digital Art from the University of Maryland Baltimore County in 2006. After returning to Hawaiʻi, she taught digital imaging and motion graphics at the college level before devoting herself fully to her studio practice in 2013.

    Jeon's work has been exhibited in more than 200 exhibitions and screenings internationally, including solo exhibitions at the Honolulu Museum of Art, Griffin Museum of Photography, Blue Sky Gallery, Head On Photo Festival, and A Smith Gallery.

    Her work has received numerous honors, including the Overall Winner award in the Julia Margaret Cameron Award, four Recognition Purchase Awards from the Hawaiʻi State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, Photolucida Critical Mass Top 200, LensCulture B&W Awards, Prix de la Photographie Paris, Tokyo International Foto Awards, and Analog Sparks Awards.

    Her work has been featured in The Huffington Post, LensCulture, FRAMES Magazine, In the In-Between, The Hand, Don't Take Pictures, Gente di Fotografia, B+W Magazine, SHOTS, Pf, Beta Developments in Photography, and Lenscratch.

    Jeon's work is held in public and private collections, including the State of Hawaiʻi Art in Public Places Collection, the International Printing Museum, the Albert O. Kuhn Library Special Collections Department at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and Haverford College.

    In addition to her studio practice, Jeon is a writer, interviewer, and independent curator whose essays and conversations on photography and visual culture have appeared in FRAMES Magazine and Lenscratch. Through her writing, she advocates for women working in photography and lens-based media while fostering dialogue around contemporary image-making.

  • 2017 PLAYA at Summerlake, Summerlake, OR.

    Awarded a 4-week, fully funded artist residency

    2017 Double Dog Dare Studio, Kauai, HI.

    One week Photo-litho and Monoprint residency

  • 2006 MFA Imaging and Digital Arts, UMBC, Catonsville MD

    2003 BA Studio Art, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI

  • 2007 – 2013

    Lecturer, New Media Arts. Kapi'olani Community College, Honolulu, HI / Intro to Digital Art; Digital Imaging; Motion Graphics; Digital Multimedia

    Fall 2010

    Lecturer, Chaminade University, Honolulu, HI / Communications Design

    2008 – 2010

    Lecturer, Art. University of Hawai'i at Manoa, Honolulu, HI / Expanded Art (Digital Art and Theory)

    Spring 2006

    Instructor of Record, Printmaking. UMBC, Catonsville, MD / Photo-Digital Processes in Non-Toxic Printmaking

    Fall 2005

    Instructor of Record, Printmaking. UMBC, Catonsville, MD / Introduction to Non-Toxic Printmaking

    Spring 2005

    Teaching Assistant, Photography. UMBC, Catonsville, MD / Time and Sequence

    Fall 2004

    Teaching Practicum, Printmaking. University of Maryland at Baltimore County, Catonsville, MD / Introduction to Non-Toxic Printmaking

    Spring 2000

    Instructor. Kapi'olani Community College, Non-Credit Division, Honolulu, HI / Introduction to Photoshop

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