Do Ho Suh: Exploring Home, Identity, and Memory at Tate Modern.

Do Ho Suh, Rubbing/Loving Project: Seoul Home 2013-2022 Installation view at Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney, Australia. Photography by Jessica Maurer. © Do Ho Suh

This spring, the Tate Modern will debut a highly anticipated exhibition celebrating the groundbreaking work of artist Do Ho Suh, his first major solo show in London in over thirty years. The exhibition promises to immerse visitors in a captivating world of expansive installations, intricate sculptures, mesmerizing videos, and thought-provoking drawings. Through these innovative works, Suh explores the complex themes of home, identity, and the human experience, inviting viewers to reflect on their own personal journeys and connections to place.

Titled "Walk the House," the exhibition draws from the rich Korean tradition of hanok, homes designed to be disassembled, moved, and reassembled, embodying the ideas of mobility and adaptability. Suh’s artwork beautifully captures this essence, exploring the intricate connections between architecture, space, the human body, and the memories that shape who we are. In his own words, “The space I’m interested in encompasses not only the physical realm but also an intangible, metaphorical, and psychological dimension. To me, ‘space’ is everything that surrounds us.”

Grounded in his personal experiences, Suh’s work invites you to engage both physically and emotionally, opening doors to a deeper exploration of your inner self. Guests will have a unique opportunity to navigate through his fabric structures—1:1 scale translucent replicas of his lived environments. Among the highlights is the ground-breaking installation Nest/s 2024, where intertwined corridors and entrances challenge our perceptions of fixed boundaries.

Additionally, ‘Perfect Home: London, Horsham, New York, Berlin, Providence, Seoul 2024’ will showcase an intimate view of Suh’s current residence in London. Adorned with whimsical architectural elements like doorknobs, light switches, and electrical sockets, this installation evokes the vibrant domestic spaces that Suh and his family have called home.

Among the captivating works on display, ‘Who Am We?’ (2000) stands out—a vibrant mosaic crafted from tens of thousands of tiny portrait photographs collected from diverse sources like school yearbooks. This piece marks an early and profound exploration by the artist into the themes of personal and collective identity.

Another poignant work is the ‘Rubbing/Loving Project: Company Housing of Gwangju Theatre’ (2012), which offers a deep reflection on the tragic aftermath of the Gwangju Uprising in South Korea in 1980.

Visitors will also encounter the key piece in this series, ‘Rubbing/Loving Project: Seoul Home’ (2013-2022). This stunning installation encapsulates a decade-long artistic journey steeped in the intimate tradition of rubbing practices in Korea. It all began when the artist meticulously covered the internal structure of his childhood home with paper, using graphite to gently caress the surface and create two-dimensional impressions that resonate with memory and emotion. Each work tells a story, inviting viewers to connect with the rich tapestry of identity and history.

The exhibition will not only highlight Do Ho Suh's iconic large-scale installations but also delve into the lesser-known aspects of his artistic practice, with a focus on works on paper created between 2000 and today. Among the standout pieces is ‘Staircase’ (2016), where Suh dissolves a paper sculpture onto a wet sheet of paper, effectively translating the three-dimensional form into a two-dimensional image. This technique mirrors the portable nature of his fabric-based architectural works, which reimagine elements of his past homes. Also on display will be Suh's intricate thread drawings, in which vibrant threads are sewn into handmade paper, continuing his exploration of fabric as a medium to define and shape space. The exhibition offers a fresh perspective on Suh's inventive approach to both space and memory.

Tate will also feature two of Do Ho Suh’s video works—'Robin Hood Gardens (2018) and ‘Dong In Apartments (2022)—which utilize photogrammetry, a technique that merges multiple images to create a digital model of the physical world. Through this process, Suh examines the built environment as a living, evolving entity, shaped by the marks left by those who once lived there. In his pursuit of recreating and preserving aspects of past and present homes, Suh highlights the impossibility of fully capturing anything—whether it be a memory, a place, or a fleeting moment. The exhibition will also include a space dedicated to Suh's ‘Bridge Project’, an ongoing investigation into the concept of the "perfect home." This work challenges the ideal of a flawless living space, addressing how such a notion intersects with pressing social, political, and environmental issues.

In this sense, Suh’s practice can be understood as a meditation on existential themes of loss, memory, and the quest for belonging. His work emphasizes the distance between the ideal and the real, the impossibility of capturing the totality of experience, and the inherent limitations in our attempts to preserve or recreate the past. In doing so, Suh highlights both the universal human desire for home and the deeply personal nature of this search—suggesting that, perhaps, home is never a place, but an ongoing, fleeting process.

Don't miss the chance to embark on this transformative journey through the fluidity of space and identity at Tate Modern—the experience promises to resonate long after you’ve left.

https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/the-genesis-exhibition-do-ho-suh