Abstrough
Abstrough is a persona created by D Hwang, an artistic device that traverses existence and the world. Born from the union of abstraction and roughness, it serves as a form that reveals the truth of an imperfect world and human existence. His work is not merely the production of images but an event that summons being and visualizes thought. This figure operates on a pre-linguistic level, embracing solitude, conflict, anxiety, and hope all at once.
Its attitude resonates with Nietzsche’s notion of amor fati. It does not reject the imperfection of the world or the suffering of existence but affirms them, discovering new possibilities for creation within impossibility itself. His practice never arrives at closure; it reveals truth only in the will that, through repeated failure, steps forward once more toward completion. This aligns with Nietzsche’s view of truth as perpetual becoming and forms a space of interruption that recalls Schopenhauer’s idea of suspending the endless cycle of desire. In this pause, the spectator encounters the essence of desire and the secret of existence.
Heidegger’s question — how does one exist in the world? — resurfaces here in the dimension of painting. The work is not representation but presence; not depiction but an existential event that shares the moment with the viewer. Though born from solitude, this solitude is wholly universal. It transcends the artist’s personal experience, disclosing the absolute loneliness that belongs to all humans, and creates a field of resonance with the spectator.
Thus, Abstrough is not merely a name but the existential persona and artistic mode of being that pervades D Hwang’s practice. It is a subject without substance, born at the threshold of solitude and desire, creation and extinction, language and silence. It is both the artist himself and the other that transcends him — a bridge between reality and unreality, and a form that unveils the truth of existence that humanity cannot ultimately escape.
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D Hwang
Studied at Parsons the new school for Design, BFA, Fine art.
"I create images on the canvas, yet at the same time I also bring forth their death. Every process of arising and passing away unfolds in silence, and the cracks and traces left behind are not mere acts of destruction but the final evidence left by time and existence. They reveal, beyond the disappearance of the image, the ultimate boundary that humanity must inevitably confront.
My painting rejects the notion of “superficial hope.” Instead, it places the viewer before their own end, asking whether they will accept that moment or turn away from it. It is not a simple object of appreciation, but a passage toward ontological reflection, a device that summons an unavoidable encounter with fundamental solitude. Thus, my work moves beyond representation, functioning as a means of visually experiencing existence poised between life and death.
Yet all of this remains only a philosophical device that guides me in the making of my work. Once a piece is completed and released into the world, its interpretation no longer belongs to me. It becomes the viewer’s domain, and a work that has left the artist’s hand possesses its own independent being. All I can do is respect the diverse exchanges that arise between the viewer and the work."