Artist Do Ho Suh is greatly influenced, aesthetically and emotionally, by the spaces that he has encountered in his lifetime. His translucent fabric sculptures recreate the fundamental structures of places where he has lived and worked. He uses colour to both depersonalize and accentuate these various locations. Passage/s (2017), shown above, guides the viewer along a passageway that introduces different experiences and styles of architecture. “We tend to focus on the destination all the time and forget about the in-between spaces,” says Suh. “But without these mundane spaces that nobody really pays attention to, these grey areas, one cannot get from point a to point b.”
Educated in Korea and the United States, Suh’s work embodies his sensitivity to the nuances of built forms. Upon first glance, his hand-sown structures seem rather fantastical, yet, on closer examination, one realizes they are rooted in the realities of our everyday surroundings. His colourful ethereal journey encourages us to reevaluate these unadorned and underappreciated spaces.