Monday, January 19, 2015

Do ho Suh

Image result for do ho suh
Do Ho Suh
For my the next artist, I wanted to dive into the work of Do ho Suh. Do ho Suh was born in Seoul, Korea, in 1962, and relocated to the United States to complete his studies at the Rhode Island School of Design and Yale University after receiving his BFA and MFA in Oriental Painting through Seoul National University and fulfilling his mandatory term of service in the South Korean Military (1). I chose Do ho Suh because of the enormity of his pieces, the scale of his work is mind blowing to me. In addition to the enormous scale, when you look at his pieces from a far you see the completed piece, but once you get closer you can see the minuet material that he uses to assemble his pieces, giving a new meaning to the work as a whole.

Cause & Effect, 
2007 acrylic and stainless steel and aluminum frame 

142.875 x 400 x 460 inches




Cause & Effect, 
2007 acrylic and stainless steel and aluminum frame 
142.875 x 400 x 460 inches
The first piece is titled “Cause & Effect”. As you can see, this piece stretches from the floor to the ceiling, with a curvilinear form of a tornado. But once you get closer to the piece, you can see that it is actually tiny little men stacked on top of each other. The piece represents individuality along with collective group support, and the coexistence of the two together. To me, I am in awe of how huge his piece is and the tenacity that he shows to complete something that is so intricate in detail.



Karma, 2010
stainless steel
276 x 26.75 x 46.5 inches




This next piece is titled “Karma”.  This piece is comprised of 98 brushed, stainless steel cast iron figures.  The piece has one man that is standing on the ground, with 97 men squatting on top of each other while each man is covering the man below his eyes.  I chose this piece due to the illusion that it seems to stretch on forever ~ reaching the highest peaks of the sky in the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at the New Orleans Museum of Art.  I can only imagine the meaning of the piece; maybe Suh is trying to portray the dependence of individuality in reference to a group as he does in “Cause and Effect”, or maybe he is trying to represent a skeleton made of men which leads support into infinity.  No matter what Suh is conveying, the massive size of his work seems to take my breath away.

Karma (detail), 2010
stainless steel

276 x 26.75 x 46.5 inches


Resources:
      1. Art 21. Do ho Suh. http://www.art21.org/artists/do-ho-suh

No comments:

Post a Comment