K-Pod

Author David Yoon became a breakout star in 2019 with his critically acclaimed YA debut novel, Frankly in Love, which hit the New York Times bestseller list and has also been optioned for a movie. In a Zoom interview, Juliana and Catherine talk to David about his path to becoming a writer, the “surreal” experience of seeing his first novel take off, and his partnership in love and literature with his wife, YA superstar author Nicola Yoon. (“I feel like I won the love lottery with her.”) Follow David Yoon on Instagram @davidoftheyoon Follow K-Pod on Instagram @kpodpod Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100 Editor: AJ Valente Producer: Jessica Park Executive Producer: HJ Lee

Ashley Park is a Tony, Grammy, and Emmy-nominated musical theater actress who has dazzled Broadway audiences with her performances in Mamma Mia, Sunday in the Park With George, The King and I and Mean Girls. She has also appeared in Netflix’s Tales of the City and off-Broadway in KPOP and Grand Horizons. But Park didn’t waltz her way into stardom without struggle. As a teenager in Ann Arbor, she was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia, necessitating eight months in the hospital. Ashley tells Catherine and Juliana about how her passion for performing fueled her recovery and shares some of the secrets to her success. Follow Ashley Park on Instagram @ashleyparklady Follow K-Pod on Instagram @kpodpod Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100 Editor: AJ Valente Producer: Jessica Park Executive Producer: HJ Lee

Visual artist KangHee Kim, best known as @tinycactus on Instagram, uses Photoshop to transform images of everyday street scenes and apartment interiors into surreal dreamscapes, all featuring portals into dreamlike worlds. On a visit to KangHee’s home and studio in Queens, Catherine and Juliana learn that the artist’s very distinctive work is directly connected to her status as a DACA recipient, which has prevented her from leaving the U.S. for over a decade. These images of “surreal escapism,” as she refers to them, have since become a form of visual therapy and have been called emblematic of today’s digital aesthetic. Follow KangHee on Instagram @tinycactus Follow K-Pod on Instagram @kpodpod Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100 Editor: AJ Valente Producer: Jessica Park Executive Producer: HJ Lee

Eunjo “Jo” Park is the executive chef at Kāwi, the fine-dining Korean restaurant opened by David Chang’s Momofuku restaurant group in New York City. Jo is at the forefront of a growing group of chefs putting modern Korean food on the map. After culinary school at CIA she climbed the ranks in some of the best kitchens in the country, including Daniel, Per Se and Momofuku Ko. She tells Catherine and Juliana about her childhood in rural Korea, learning to cook for herself while her parents ran a dry cleaners, a devastating injury early on in her career, and the challenges lying ahead. Follow Jo Park on Instagram @eunjoful Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100 Editor: AJ Valente Producer: Jessica Park Executive Producer: HJ Lee

Welcome to Season 2 of K-Pod! For our opening episode, we’re turning the tables on the show’s co-hosts, writer Catherine Hong and photographer Juliana Sohn. The longtime friends chat with the founder of KoreanAmericanStory.org, HJ Lee, about their first meeting (at summer school in the 1980s!), their work for magazines, and what’s most surprised them about doing the podcast. Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100 Editor: AJ Valente Producer: Jessica Park Executive Producer: HJ Lee

For our season finale of K-Pod, we interviewed Young Huh, one of the most sought-after interior designers in the country. Young is known for creating stylish interiors based on classic proportions, luxurious materials and an understanding for how people live. By all measures, 2019 was a banner year for Young: her room at the Kips Bay Decorator Show House was the talk of the New York design world and she was named to Elle Decor’s A-list. Catherine and Juliana find out what it’s like working at the top ranks of the industry; how she gets results from contractors without being a screamer; and all about her “miserable” slog through law school before finding the courage to defy her parents (her dad’s famous words: “Lawyer is better!”) and pursue a creative life. This is the final episode of K-Pod season 1! Thank you to all our listeners for tuning in every week and giving us your positive feedback. We will be back in 2020 with season 2 with even more great stories from Korean American creatives. Please email us at k-pod@koreanamericanstory.org with your suggestions and comments!Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/o1VOcG4CxSEFollow Young Huh on Instagram @younghuhHosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100Executive Producer: Hj LeeEditor: AJ Valenteinstagram.com/kpodpodyoutube.com/koreanamericanstoryorg

Jenny Kwak put Korean food on the map when she opened the restaurant Dok Suni in New York's East Village in 1992 when she was just 19.  Later, she opened a second successful restaurant, Do Hwa, where Quentin Tarantino was famously an investor. Catherine and Juliana catch up with the pioneering chef-restaurateur at her new Brooklyn restaurant, Haenyeo, where she’s flexing her creativity with dishes like cajun-inflected dduk boki. Jenny talks about her thwarted plans to be a painter; the rollicking early days of Dok Suni; her ambivalence about celebrity chef culture and her close relationship with her mom (who still keeps her kimchi recipe a secret, even from Jenny).Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/bd6haUYcmDMFollow on Instagram: @haenyeobk @jennyk.bkHosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100Executive Producer: Hj LeeEditor: AJ Valenteinstagram.com/kpodpodyoutube.com/koreanamericanstoryorg

Byron Kim is a Brooklyn-based artist who works in an area known as the abstract sublime. Part of the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, his minimalist paintings sit at the threshold between abstraction and representation, conceptualism and pure painting. Catherine and Juliana learn about Byron’s original plan to become a poet (he switched to art, thinking it would be “easier”); his physician parents, who immigrated to New York back in the 1950s; the gigs that got him through his early years as a struggling New York artist (four words: Skadden Arps graveyard shift); his career breakthrough at the landmark 1993 Whitney Biennial; and his ongoing series known as “Sunday Paintings,” arguably his most personal work to date.Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/ode9nx0PdDUHosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100Executive Producer: Hj LeeEditor: AJ Valenteinstagram.com/kpodpodyoutube.com/koreanamericanstoryorg

Soyoung Lee built her career at Metropolitan Museum of Art where she was the museum’s first curator of Korean art, organizing such landmark shows as  “Silla: Korea’s Golden Kingdom” and “Diamond Mountains: Travel and Nostalgia in Korean Art." Last year, after 15 years at the Met, she was appointed Chief Curator of the Harvard Art Museums. She talks to Juliana and Catherine about her childhood as the daughter of a South Korean diplomat living in Jakarta, Stockholm and London; her early love of Japanese art; and the challenges of making ancient art compelling to modern American audiences.Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/4nuVk3Ka2JkHosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100Executive Producer: Hj LeeEditor: AJ Valenteinstagram.com/kpodpodyoutube.com/koreanamericanstoryorg

Romon K. Yang — aka Rostarr — is a Brooklyn-based artist, currently living in Bali, who works in painting, drawing, sculpture, digital and film. His signature works are large-scale black-and-white abstract paintings that recall both calligraphy and street art. In 2016, he collaborated with Nike on a much-coveted collection of sneakers and apparel; he has also created work for the Standard Hotels group and Moncler. Rostarr tells Catherine and Juliana about his rebellious childhood in Virginia, his fraught relationship with his parents, and the years he spent as a breakdancer, graphic designer and music industry art director before finding his calling as an artist.Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/jxYaLowMj08Hosts: Juliana Sohn @juliana_sohn Catherine Hong @catherinehong100Executive Producer: Hj LeeEditor: AJ Valenteinstagram.com/kpodpodyoutube.com/koreanamericanstoryorg