Visible things can be invisible.
However, our powers of thought grasp both the visible and the invisible.
- Rene Magritte -
I am Sooyeon Ahn, a designer, interdisciplinary researcher, and artist who loves to explore new knowledge and technologies. My goal is to help people live better lives by supporting human cognitive development with science and technology, with a strong emphasis on a human-centered design approach. In particular, I have explored how digital interactions can enable people to become aware of and manage things that are difficult to perceive, such as emotions or unconscious behaviors. I specialize in human-computer interaction (HCI), spatial computing, UX/UI, and interaction design.
I earned B.F.A in Painting and Media Art from Seoul National University, South Korea, and M.S. in Industrial Design from Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), South Korea. During the Master's program, I worked with Prof. Hwajung Hong in DxD Lab.
NEWS
June, 2025
Our pictorial 'Designing OWN' received the BP Honorable Mention at C&C 2025đ
March, 2025
C&C 2025 Pictorial acceptedđ
January, 2025
Sooyeon joined Ailike.ME as a Product Designer
December, 2024
Sooyeon participated in exhibition âCrossing Over: Innovation and Boundariesâ at Ground Seoul
November, 2024
Sooyeon certified in âBoost Course <Generative AI 2024>â by Naver Connect Foundation
October, 2024
Sooyeon awarded âOutstanding Contribution Awardâ from COGITO
August, 2024
Sooyeon certified in âBoost Course <Data Science 2024> â by Naver Connect Foundation
June, 2024
Sooyeon successfully defended her M.S. Thesis
PROJECTS
EE-SCAPE
(2024)
Sooyeon Ahn, Eunmi Kim, Hwajung Hong
EE-Scape is a VR mindfulness application that alleviates impulsive eating triggered by emotional reasons. Our preliminary studies indicated that most emotional eaters reflect some meanings to the food(e.g., a friend comforting me). To deal with these emotional bonds, EE-SScape provides a novel virtual food experience that allows users to perceive the food differently and reflect on their emotional eating habits.
Link to Video
MindBattery
(2022-2024)
Kwangyoung Lee, Sooyeon Ahn, Jong-ok Hong, Jaehyun Lim, Namgoo Park, Uichin Lee, Hwajung Hong
MThe fast-paced and demanding nature of call center work prevents ability from recognizing worker's emotional states. In this study, we developed MindBattery, a smartphone application designed to support the emotional well-being by using a battery analogy to help call center workers gauge their emotional energy depletion and provide a set of microbreaks for emotional recovery.
MindTerior
(2022-2023)
Ain Lee, Juhyun Lee, Sooyeon Ahn, Youngik Lee *All contributed equally to this work.
MindTerior is a mental health care game for people with mild emotional difficulties. It analyzes each player's emotional state and shows the results as visual elements in the game space. It also suggests a gamified evidence-based mental health care activity that allows players to cope with their emotional problems.
Link to Publication, Video
OWN
(2021-2022)
Sooyeon Ahn, Heeyoung Beak, Gill Son, Dongbum Kim
OWN is a 3D virtual space that elaborately visualizes the abstract and invisible inner world. It was dedicatedly tailor-designed for just one person(OWNer) through in-depth psychological analysis. The psychologists suggest various therapeutic elements, which the designer visualizes as space in the virtual world. OWN comprises synaesthetic elements based on color psychology, environmental psychology, and art therapy to help calm the mind.
Link to Video
Mind-room
(2020)
Sooyeon Ahn, Youngjae Kim, Minha Kang
Mind-room is an online test designed to increase people's awareness of their emotional state. It analyzes each user's emotional state based on how they react to various situations during a virtual journey, then suggests an emotionally calming room designed based on various theories such as color psychology and art therapy.
For the STARved
(2021)
Sooyeon Ahn, Youngjae Kim, Doeun Kim, Seojin Park, Seungyun Oh, Minha Kang, Wootae Kim
For the STARved is an astrophotography exhibition held in an online 3D virtual space. It allows people starved of stars due to the pandemic to freely explore beautiful and fantastic galleries and watch astrophotographs taken by club members.
Link to For the STARved, Red Dot, Video
ARTWORKS
Meta-Gaia
(Group Project) Sooyeon Ahn, Minsun Kim, Geunyong Park, Stella Yolanda
âGaia, the first god who created the world, was followed by humans as Meta-Gaia. When the shadow of New God casts, the Earth is distorted.â Meta-Gaia visually explores the profound impact of human activities on Earth's ecosystems. It gracefully immerses viewers in a meditative and thought-provoking experience.
Boundary Project
My self had separated into two distinct selves: the outer self and the inner self. The Boundary Project is the process of accepting both divided selves as part of me and eventually integrating them into one.
Inner Garden Project
Inner Garden Project is the process of recognizing my hidden dark shadows. The âInner Gardenâ is an inner cozy space where I am able to meet my own inner self. My each inner self has been submerged in each room keeping with my hidden depression as a hard but soft stone, a faint but sparkling light, and a parched but living tree.
Remember Project
My grandfather had suffered from a loss of memory. At his last moment, I was afraid of forgetting about him forever if I didnât leave him in the picture. <Remember Project> is a project starting from my regret of not leaving my grandfatherâs last in the picture, to try to remember him in a different way.
The Gap
No matter how we try to reach each other, there is an unreachable gap between us. My closest others(friends and family) and I stand face to face, and there is a thin, white fabric between us. We sew a Korean word, âí,â which means a gap, to visualize a space where we felt for each other on white fabric. The gap is a space where sometimes is been apart, sometimes is been closely, and sometimes is been in a tangle.
Not to be Erased
In the history of the war, there are countless people who were disappeared under the shadow of the hero. History do not record them even if each of them has their own valuable and precious. In the âNot to be Erased,â I tried to express the pain of about 352,862 people disappeared by the war as inscribing them one by one with my hands.
@2024. Syeon. all right reserved. Programmed by. Enif