We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Misty EunJoo Choi a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Misty EunJoo, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

With CuppyBreak, I design and sculpt a growing collection of unique cups meant to be experienced as a combination of installation and performance, where participants’ experiences vary based on their answers to personal questions.

This past February, I transformed my studio into a makeshift cafe and asked visitors to answer either of the following questions:

“How do you deal with your broken relationships?” or “What is your social tool?”

Visitors would then be served coffee or tea in a unique cup based on their answer, and we would have a conversation about their response. The possibilities of cups ranged from those that were functional (yet misshapen), connected, incomplete, cracked, broken, or dysfunctional. The frustration or disappointment of being served a cup that risked spilling and making a mess soon turned into excitement, laughter, and vulnerability.

Currently, I am producing more cups and getting ready for their first sale this coming fall. I envision growing CuppyBreak not only into art exhibitions but also as a cafe and marketplace that presents a restful moment in people’s everyday lives with a curation of artistic objects and experiences that ask mischievous and norm-breaking questions.

CuppyBreak represents everything I believe a work of art can embody—an object, interactive participation, conversation, bonding, and the everyday. For me, a cup of coffee, whether with loved ones or by myself, is a basic yet happy moment in daily life. Anything that matters in your everyday life, no matter how mundane, could enter the realm of art. I believe that the everyday is the most genuine form of art, with the art of the everyday being a core value and direction of my practice over the years.

The first moment I explored the everydayness of art, and the precursor to CuppyBreak, was in 2018 through the writing of “The Coffee I Drink Everyday Is Different But the Cigarette That the Man Smokes Is the Same.” Learn more about my book here: https://www.printedmatter.org/catalog/58580

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Misty EunJoo Choi, and I am a Korean artist currently living and working in Los Angeles. Having lived in Seoul, Chicago, London, New York, and Los Angeles in my 20s shaped my interdisciplinary practice. When I say, “I live by making art,” I mean it quite literally. Each work is a temporary dwelling where I connect with my inner self, take care of her, and seek comfort. Art has fueled my journey of settling down—of finding solace in an object, place, headspace, or relationship. Ever since I realized that the everyday is the best source and material for my art practice, I have explored and manifested the intangible, ephemeral nature of lived experiences, shaping my findings into public interventions, performative sculptures, interactive installations, architectural prototypes, and an artist’s book.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I like to work by designing my systems and setting goals. I allow for accidents, accept failure, and embrace spontaneity. Knowing that achieving my goals won’t be easy, I prefer to view unexpected events as happy accidents. They teach me to think outside the box and expand my skills, leading me to unexpected places in my practice. This way, there are no failures or disappointments—only opportunities to be flexible and experimental.

That is how CuppyBreak started. In the beginning, I had an idea to make multiples of cups and variations of forms. To do so, I taught myself to make a mold out of cups from scratch. In the first attempt to get a ceramic casting out of the mold, the handle of the cup came out broken, which was at first heartbreaking. However, soon I loved the idea of a cup with a flaw; even though an object loses a form that enables its function, it is still functional in its own way. I came up with the narrative of the misshapen cups as analogous to how human beings are different from each other. We are prone to be broken in relationships; however, we learn and grow from such crooked and broken relationships. Instead of hiding or remaking the broken dysfunctional cups, I explored making more vulnerable shapes of cups. As a result, it turned out to be a fun journey of crafting funky cup experiences–CuppyBreak!

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

As mentioned previously I am currently producing more cups in preparation for their first sale this Fall. My vision for CuppyBreak extends beyond art exhibitions; I aim to develop it into a café and marketplace. This space will offer a restful pause in people’s everyday lives, featuring a curated selection of artistic objects and experiences that provoke mischievous, norm-breaking questions.

In doing so, I think a lot about how art can function in my life and, therefore, in people’s lives too. Speaking of the function of art, I hope the act of making art introduces me to people with whom I can share my thoughts on everyday life, build a community, connect with the outer world, and also make a living.

I aim to practice the idea of the art of the everyday and the function of art by situating my art practice within the context of business and entrepreneurship. I hope to meet more audiences in mundane places like cafes, restaurants, storefronts, parks, beaches, deserts, and anywhere that allows me to show my work.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://mistychoi.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/misty.study/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmCFBgKeo4K60gPDaQmPh5g

Image Credits

Misty Choi, Grace Kang Hallberg