HAYEON U (b. 1993, Suwon, South Korea) is a Korean painter whose work explores the unresolved terrain between certainty and doubt, presence and absence, self and world.

After earning a degree in Business Administration, Hayeon worked as a designer in Korea's entertainment industry, including album art, before leaving to paint full-time. Without formal art training, she built an independent visual language out of steady observation and self-reflection, developed continuously since her school years.

Central to her practice is the notion of the "in-between": not a condition to be resolved, but a state she returns to and complicates across bodies of work, marked by ambiguous space and a gaze that never quite settles. Her paintings don't resolve emotional tension so much as sit inside it, holding vulnerability and resilience at once. For Hayeon, painting is less the illustration of an idea than a way of discovering it.

Her work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions in Seoul, including the group exhibition August Come They Will(2024, gallery h-u-e) and the solo show Walking the In-between (2025, ARTE J / Art Works Paris Seoul Gallery), and at Korean art fairs including BAMA (2025) and ART BUSAN (2026), both with gallery h-u-e. She lives and works in Suwon, South Korea.

More of Hayeon’s work may be found on her website and Instagram.

Below we provide the information on the exhibition of the paintings discussed and featured in The Pasticheur:

Artists
Hyeon O
U Hayeon

Exhibition: GAZE
Type: Duo Exhibition
Dates: November 8–29, 2026
Venue: h-u-e (gallery hue)
W Square, 1F, 145 Bunpo-ro, Nam-gu, Busan, South Korea

For inquiries: gallery_hue@naver.com
Instagram: @gallery_h_u_e