Born: 1962 Seoul, South Korea
Other name/s: Do-Ho Suh
Biography
Artist Do Ho Suh was born Seoul, South Korea in 1962, studying Oriental Painting at Seoul National University, earning both a BFA (1985) and MFA (1987). His artistic journey took a significant turn when he relocated to the USA, receiving a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1994 and an MFA in sculpture from Yale University in 1997. This pivotal move ignited Suh's interest in 'transitional spaces' such as staircases and doorways, which for him represented the tangible and intangible thresholds between his Korean heritage and his new American context. Suh’s diverse oeuvre, including sculptural installations, drawings and film, meticulously explores contemporary spatial arrangements, questioning the conventional delineation of space in terms of individuality and collectivity, reality and illusion, as well as mobility and stasis. His extensive travels and life across continents, between South Korea, the USA and UK, have profoundly shaped his practice, underscoring the intricate relationship between personal identity and the broader, collective cultural experience.
Fascinated by the malleability of both physical and metaphorical space, Suh creates site-specific installations that challenge notions of identity through full-scale fabric recreations of domestic spaces, significant to his personal history, including his childhood home in Korea and residences in Rhode Island and New York. Suh acknowledges that the traditional Korean-style house he grew up in has a pivotal influence on his understanding of displacement. Built in the 1970s amidst Korea's rapid Westernisation and modernisation, his parents' decision to construct a traditional house served as a personal and cultural statement. Suh describes it as a ‘very special place’, likening it to a ‘secret garden’ that exists out of time (Wagner 2012). Suh explores the nuances of belonging, memory, and the intersection of personal and cultural identity. His art is about carrying the essence of 'home' with him, challenging the traditional concept of home being tied to a physical location. His works are deeply rooted in the idea that spaces, rather than objects, hold and convey memories. Suh emphasises that the process of organising, travelling, and communicating in order to transport his work to various exhibition spaces is as integral to the artwork itself as are the physical changes and wear on his fabric installations, which embody the memory and experience of each specific space they inhabit.
Suh's art takes a unique approach to space and form, employing repetition as a meditative process to explore the multiplicities of individuality. Ranging from interlinked figures on fishing nets and monumental tornado-like forms, to empty uniforms and yearbook photos, each piece sensitively investigates the intersection of personal space with the collective sphere. This is perhaps most evident in his signature fabric installations — ethereal, translucent sculptures that replicate architectural structures and everyday objects, such as kitchen sinks, toilets, and microwaves, often using translucent celadon silk and smoky nylon. These pieces, often recreations of Suh's past residences, blur the line between imagination and reality, embodying the Korean philosophy of an open home environment, where the boundaries between psychic interior and objective exterior merge. The physicality and conceptual depth of Suh's work stems from his unique perspective on architecture, which he views not as a mere container, but as a passage or portal through which memory and identity traverse. Suh contrasts the Western emphasis on permanence and rigidity with the Eastern tradition of flexibility and permeability in architecture, challenging the viewer to reconsider the role of the built environment in shaping human experience. A compelling aspect of Suh's work is his juxtaposition of the ordinary with the monumental, exploring their roles in shaping identity. His life-sized fabric installations invite viewers to physically engage, altering their spatial perception and underscoring collective consciousness. His Karma series (2010) — a monumental bronze sculpture of human figures stacked atop each other — uses scale to highlight the power of unity and the karmic ties that interlink our generational experiences, emphasising strength in numbers and societal interconnectedness.
Suh has exhibited extensively in the UK. Highlights include: Do Ho Suh, Serpentine Gallery, London (2002); Touched, Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool (2010) and Staircase-III, Tate Modern (2011). In 2013, Suh was named Innovator of the Year in Art by the Wall Street Journal and was honoured with the 2017 Ho-Am Prize, considered the Korean counterpart to the Nobel Prize. Suh's public commission Bridging Home, London (unveiled in 2018 by Sculpture in the City), explores migration, memory, and the concept of home. Set atop a footbridge over Wormwood Street in the City of London, this architecturally-scaled installation—a traditional Korean Hanok house, seemingly out of place amid the modern skyline—serves as a powerful visual metaphor for cross-cultural displacement and integration. Recent solo exhibitions include Bloomberg SPACE, London (2021) and Modern One, National Galleries of Scotland (2024). In the UK his work is represented in the public domain in the collections of Tate and Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Bradford, and in the Sculpture in the City commission.
Related books
- Christopher Allen, 'Review: Do Ho Suh at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia in Sydney', The Australian, 20 January 2023
- En Young Ahn, 'Harbouring Home: Do Ho Suh At The Mca ', Art Monthly Australia, Summer 2022/2023, p. 37
- Portal - Do Ho Suh, exhibition catalogue (New York: DelMonico Books-D.A.P, 2022)
- Martin Coomer, Allegra Presenti and Sarah J. S. Suzuki, Do Ho Suh: Works on Paper at STPI, exhibition catalogue (Singapore, New York: STPI Creative Workshop & Gallery, 2021)
- Do-Ho Suh, Suzanne Swarts, Sarah J. S. Suzuki and Irene Müller, Do Ho Suh, exhibition catalogue (Wassenaar: Museum Voorlinden, 2019)
- Gareth Harris, 'Do Ho Suh House Sculpture Stays Put in London's Square Mile', The Art Newspaper, 11 November 2018
- Lindsay Christians, ‘At MMOCA, Do Ho Suh Stitches Memory of Home: Arts’ Madison Capital Times, 15 February 2017, p. 34
- Do-Ho Suh, Rochelle Steiner, Clara Kim and Elizabeth A. T. Smith, Do Ho Suh: Drawings, exhibition catalogue (Prestel, Munich: DelMonico Books, 2014)
- 'Have You Ironed your Room Yet?: Adrian Searle visits Do-Ho Suh's Fabulous Fabric Flats', The Guardian, 23 April 2002, p. 12
Related organisations
- Rhode Island School of Design (student)
- Seoul National University (student)
- Yale University (student)
Related web links
- ‘Coming Home. A Conversation with Do Ho Suh’, Int Ar, Vol.7, pp. 46-59, Lea Hershkowitz
- ‘Do Ho Suh: Bridging Home, London’, Lehmann Maupin
- Do Ho Suh, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia
- Do Ho Suh, Specimens
- ‘Do Ho Suh. Un-built Art and the Impossibility of Permanence’, Francesca Romana Forlini, KoozArch
Selected exhibitions
- Modern One, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh (2024)
- UNBUILD: a Site of Possibility, group exhibition, Drawing Room, London (2023)
- The Living House, group exhibition, Van Gogh House, London (2023)
- Do Ho Suh, Bloomberg SPACE, London, UK (2021)
- Do Ho Suh, Lehmann Maupin, London, UK (2020-2021)
- Portable Sculpture, group exhibition, Henry Moore Institute, Leeds (2021)
- Robin Hood Gardens, V&A, London, UK (2019)
- Art Night 2017, group exhibition, Christ Church Spitalfields, London (2017)
- Passage/s, Victoria Miro, London (2017)
- New York City Apartment/Bristol, Bristol Museum & Art Gallery, Bristol (2015)
- Going Public: International Art Collectors in Sheffield, group exhibition, Millenium Gallery, Museum Sheffield (2015)
- Staircase-III, installation, Tate Modern, London (2011)
- A Perfect Home: Bridge Project, Slade School of Fine Art, University College London (2010)
- Bridging Home, Touched, Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool (2010)
- Do Ho Suh, Serpentine Gallery, London (2002)
