Thanks to her unique approach of reinterpreting iconic characters from popular culture dressed in hanbok, the traditional Korean attire, Korean illustrator Wooh Nayoung has established herself as a key figure in contemporary digital illustration. Her work reimagines widely recognizable figures and transports them to a new cultural context where tradition and modernity interact naturally.

Nayoung studied Oriental painting at Ewha Women’s University and developed an early interest in comics and video games. These influences emerged in her visual language, combining the delicacy of Korean painting with references to animation and digital media. She began her career in the video game industry as a pixel artist at Nexon, working on titles such as The Kingdom of the Winds.

She gained international recognition with the Fairy Tale series, in which she transforms characters from Western fairy tales, especially Disney princesses, into figures embedded in Korean culture. Defying expectations, she chose not to integrate the hanbok into traditional Korean narratives but instead to insert it into foreign universes, creating a contrast that redefines the familiar.

This approach defines her artistic practice. Rather than cultural fusion, her work offers new perspectives. Her pieces transform the familiar into something different, offering a renewed experience and ultimately fostering a visual dialogue between cultures. This approach has drawn the attention of major companies such as Disney, Marvel, and Netflix. She has collaborated with these companies to reinterpret characters like Thor and Spider-Man through the visual codes of Korean tradition.

In 2019, she received an award from the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism for promoting the hanbok. In 2023, she was named an honorary ambassador for the Cultural Heritage Administration.