Foreign art students leave signature on local cultural scene with graduation exhibits
Published: 28 Nov. 2025, 13:40
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- LEE TAE-HEE
- [email protected]
![Pictures show designs for Bouddakham Phavina's ″A Garden of Joys″ project and a miniature of the buildings. [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/11/28/59c1c6c4-2e01-4c1f-8be5-423cabe7e6cb.jpg)
Pictures show designs for Bouddakham Phavina's ″A Garden of Joys″ project and a miniature of the buildings. [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]
As art departments get busy amid the graduation exhibition season, a small but growing number of international students are navigating what it’s like to stage their final exhibitions far from home.
Walking around university campuses about a month before the end of the semester, it's not unusual to see posters and placards promoting art students' graduation exhibitions.
As a graduation requirement, art students must create their own works and hold a departmental graduation exhibition. The process starts a year before, with students taking courses for two semesters that guide them to hold their exhibit successfully.
"It started in the spring semester, with us doing research and making prototypes," said Bouddakham Phavina, a senior at Ewha Womans University's Department of Design from Laos. "We also worked over the summer vacation since the exhibition was set to open late October, and creating the final works started at the beginning of the fall semester."
Courses in the first semester of the graduation exhibition preparation tend to have curricula that allow students to choose their topic and conduct relevant research, while the second-semester course allows students actually to create their works.
More and more international students have been studying in Korea, but art isn't necessarily a field with a prominent international student body.
According to the Ministry of Education, 120,150 international students were pursuing undergraduate degrees as of April 2025, with 76,774 majoring in humanities and social sciences, 23,631 in engineering and 11,200 in arts and physical education.
While small in number, international students leave a strong mark with their work.
The Korea JoongAng Daily sat down with two international students who wrapped up their graduation exhibition — Phavina and El jyidi Chaimae from Hongik University's Department of Industrial Design from Morocco — to talk about their experience.
Below are edited excerpts from the interview, edited for length and clarity.
![A miniature building made for Bouddakham Phavina's ″A Garden of Joys″ project. [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/11/28/f789aeeb-f9ed-47e0-aaea-266fa65f63c0.jpg)
A miniature building made for Bouddakham Phavina's ″A Garden of Joys″ project. [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]
Q. What made you study art in Korea?
El jyidi: Before I came to Korea, I was an electrical engineering student in Morocco. I studied it until junior year, but didn't graduate. I wanted to try studying abroad and experience new things, and didn't just consider Korea but also looked into other countries in Europe. But when I was at university, I got a job at a Korean company in Morocco. I worked for two years, developed my Korean and got to know the culture, which made me think about studying in Korea. I searched for colleges of fine arts and industrial design majors since that was my area of interest, and I found out about Hongik University. It said Hongik University has one of the top art programs in Korea, so I decided to give it a shot and got accepted. It wasn't really a path I planned from the beginning, but it was more of a natural decision.
Phavina: I was interested in interior and architectural design since I was young, with my family taking me to many design exhibitions and fairs. So, I wanted to be an architect and design my home since I was young. Later, in high school, I developed an interest in K-pop and Korean culture. K-pop was a starting point for me, but I became interested because Korea doesn't only have K-pop. They have very innovative and creative designs, which made me study art here.
![The ROOT robot, El jyidi Chaimae's graduation exhibition work [LEE TAE-HEE]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/11/28/9442e7ed-91e2-4338-9989-a8096373a118.jpg)
The ROOT robot, El jyidi Chaimae's graduation exhibition work [LEE TAE-HEE]
Q. Can you explain a bit about your graduation exhibition work?
El jyidi: I chose the topic of whether people will be able to safely enjoy outdoor activities in the distant future as the environment and weather continue to change. Within that topic, my first piece is an AI Companion Robot called ROOT. It’s a bipedal robot, and you can think of it as a friend that can join you in various outdoor activities like skiing or hiking. Since it runs on an AI-based system, it also serves as a guide, helping you move around safely outdoors. There are also other products, like a smart tent that allows users to interact and feel safe inside. An XR application also helps users experience elements of nature and weather that are hard to encounter in person.
I actually only spent around four months designing the robots. The smart tent was actually my main project, and I thought I couldn't make the robot. But my professor came to me and said we had a collaboration with the Korea Institute of Science and Technology and that I should try to make the robot. So, I started from scratch in July. I really wanted it to be a bipedal robot, but I also wanted the design to stand out. When you think of outdoor robots, many are four-legged. Design-wise, many of them resemble animals, like puppies. But I wanted to make one that looked strong but also cute, which is why ROOT has round edges. I also didn't want it to look too much like animals. If a robot resembles animals like puppies or kittens, it simply becomes a puppy or kitten robot. But if it doesn't, you can give it a character of its own.
Phavina: I took the Graduate Study for Exhibition Design and Graduate Study for Interior Design courses to help me prepare for the graduation exhibition. For my work in interior design, I focused on designs that can revitalize the local community. The project is titled "A Garden of Joys" and proposes a small amusement park in the Hoehyeon-dong 1-ga area that can encourage physical activity and solve the problem of social isolation. I designed three activity spaces: one is the study area, where older people can have a garden workshop, and the second is a stretching area for exercise. The last area, called stop, is where older people can rest.
My second project in exhibition design focused on Jeju Island. The project is named "Stone by Stone: Preserving Jeju's Landscape Center" and sheds light on Jeju's stone wall as a cultural heritage. I 3-D-printed stone blocks, and visitors can engage with the exhibition by stacking them.
![3D-printed stones for Bouddakham Phavina's ″Stone by Stone: Preserving Jeju's Landscape Center″ project are stacked on top of each other [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/11/28/deed3d3d-2d9e-426f-be4d-70a6ec6938d0.jpg)
3D-printed stones for Bouddakham Phavina's ″Stone by Stone: Preserving Jeju's Landscape Center″ project are stacked on top of each other [BOUDDAKHAM PHAVINA]
Q. Do art majors in your home country also have graduation exhibitions? What are some differences?
El jyidi: Morocco doesn't have many colleges of fine arts, and the ones we do have aren't very popular. I don't think we even have one offering an industrial design program. But I have friends studying in Italy and other European countries, and their graduation exhibitions differ from those in Korea, as they tend to feature works that are less tech-oriented and crafted by hand. They also tend to focus less on visualization, making mock-ups of the product and taking nice photos of it. But for graduation exhibitions in Korea, many of us also make videos of our works, focus on visualization and do image rendering.
Phavina: They also have graduation exhibitions, but seniors mostly do graduation proposals. You present your work to the professor, talking about how the design works.
Q. When preparing your graduation exhibition, you also need to find print shops and vendors to help produce your work. Was it challenging to figure out where to go?
El jyidi: I got recommendations or looked online. For the black ROOT robot, I had a mock-up made, and I made the white ROOT robot myself; the mock-up vendor was where many of our seniors made their graduation projects. When making other things, like stickers, I looked online or called many businesses myself. I actually even had some classmates ask me if there were any good vendors, and I would tell them the places I found.
Phavina: In our third year, we do the Mayday Exhibition. Through that, we learn where to go if we want to print things or do laser cutting. Our professors are also kind and recommended places when I didn't know where to buy certain materials or which print shops to go to. My friends also provided me with information and even went with me to help communicate with the owner. Also, a lucky thing for us is that we have a Maker's Lab at Ewha. We can do 3-D printing for free, which I used to make the stone blocks for my exhibition design project.
Q. Graduation exhibitions can be expensive. How much did it cost to make your work?
![A black-colored version of ROOT, exhibited at Design Korea 2025 [KOREA INSTITUTE OF DESIGN PROMOTION]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2025/11/28/fd3e60d5-7a89-4db5-8027-23440c315e0f.jpg)
A black-colored version of ROOT, exhibited at Design Korea 2025 [KOREA INSTITUTE OF DESIGN PROMOTION]
Phavina: I haven't precisely calculated how much it cost, but I did save up for the graduation exhibition beforehand. However, that was definitely not enough. For my projects, doing laser cutting and the materials I used to create the building models were expensive. Some of the things I printed weren't in standard paper sizes, also making it costly.
Q. What are your plans after graduation?
El jyidi: I wanted to get a job, but reality is different. The design industry has been struggling since last year, and companies are hiring fewer people. It's also not that easy to get a job as a foreigner. But I recently applied for a master's program at Hongik University. My professor suggested I continue researching the ROOT robot for another two years and even try mass production. I thought about it for a week and applied, and I'm set to start my master's.
Phavina: After graduation, I've always felt I would like to work here, but I also sometimes miss home. But right now, I've been working on a project with my sister and her friend to create a sofa brand called Home & Co. Laos. We designed our first collection of sofas to support posture and reduce back pain. Doing this project, I feel like the first step in my journey is to combine the knowledge I gained in Korea with our love for helping others back in Laos.
BY LEE TAE-HEE [[email protected]]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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