Sung Jang in Newcity Design 50

Photo: Joseph A. Mietus
Caption: Mary Wisniewski

Sung Jang, Associate Professor & Chair of Industrial Design, was featured in Newcity Design 50, as one of the fifty designers who help shape Chicago.

An associate professor and chair of Industrial Design at UIC, Sung Jang also co-founded Article, LLC., an industrial design studio, and has his own eponymous design studio, SungJang. He has worked with the brands Louis Vuitton, Guzzini and Roche Bobois. Sung says that navigating between design and art has been trickier than expected. “While art practice is an inward-focused activity where ‘I’ or ‘my experience’ is the primary factor of the narrative, design deals with external things like problems others face either as individuals or in a system, which takes a lot of effort to understand,” he says. “I work on a very wide range of projects—one day I am a painter, the next day I am working to solve logistic bottlenecks in instant noodle packaging. The amount of new things I am faced with at this stage of my career is sometimes daunting, but at least it’s never boring.” Sung says he has made a shift to a “naturalist position” which “aligns with the kind of poise and philosophy of traditional Korean artists and craftsmen.”

UIC BDES alums Jacob Lindgren and Paul Zdon were also featured in the Graphic Design category. Mentioned in the Newcity 50 Hall of Fame were Felicia Ferrone, Clinical Associate Professor of Industrial Design, Norman Teague, Assistant Professor of Industrial Design, and Renata Graw, UIC MDES alum.

To read more, please visit Newcity Design 50 2024.