SUWANEE — A Suwanee student has been named one of the top young artists in the nation after earning the highest honor in the 2026 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards.
Joyce Kim, a senior at Won Art Studio in Suwanee, received a Gold Medal Portfolio Award for her mixed media portfolio, “Fear of the Uncontrollable.” The award places Kim among a select group of students recognized nationally for outstanding creative work.
The Gold Medal Portfolio Award is the program’s highest honor. Kim was selected from more than 700 portfolio submissions that advanced to national adjudication, with each recipient receiving a $12,500 scholarship.
Kim’s portfolio explores her experience immigrating from Korea to the United States in 2016 and the fear, anxiety and perfectionism that followed as she adjusted to a new language, culture and environment.
“Art became a way for me to process those feelings visually and honestly,” Kim said. “‘Fear of the Uncontrollable’ was especially meaningful to me because it was a topic I genuinely felt connected to and wanted to communicate to others in a way that could resonate emotionally.”
Kim said perfectionism shaped much of her early approach to art. For years, she focused on making each piece technically strong enough to prove herself. That changed after she attended Georgia’s Governor’s Honors Program, where she was introduced to abstract painting and began focusing more on process, composition and emotion.
“Once I stopped obsessing over perfection and focused more on the bigger picture and the emotions behind the work, I actually started enjoying making art more,” Kim said.
Her creative process for the portfolio was experimental and intuitive, she said. Rather than relying on strict sketches or detailed plans, Kim allowed the work to evolve as she created it. She said that approach connected directly to the portfolio’s theme of learning to accept uncertainty.
One of the most challenging pieces in the collection was “Need to Peel,” which pushed Kim outside her usual style.
“With that piece, I tried to push myself to be more bold and experimental rather than focusing heavily on tiny details and realism like I normally would,” Kim said.
Kim said she was surprised when she learned she had received the national honor. She was on a Zoom call with her high school art teacher, the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards team and her mother when she received the news.
“My mom and I were screaming with excitement as soon as the call ended,” Kim said. “It was a really memorable moment for me.”
The recognition was especially meaningful, she said, because the work reflected personal experiences and emotions.
“A lot of my work came from very personal emotions and experiences, so receiving a national award for something that honest and vulnerable felt really rewarding and encouraging as an artist,” Kim said.
Kim plans to attend Yale University, where she hopes to study the connection between psychology and visual arts. She said she also hopes to expand her work through murals, digital art, collaborative projects and interdisciplinary design.
“My ultimate goal as an artist is to continue inspiring others and creating work that feels emotionally honest and relatable for people like me,” Kim said.
Gold Medal Portfolio recipients will be recognized June 10 during a national ceremony at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
