DO HO SUH 097


documents the interiors and exteriors of the condemned Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar, east London. Suh’s panoramic film, which was commissioned by the V&A for the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale, employs 3D scanning, photogrammetry, time-lapse photography and drone footage to create an intriguing portrait of the iconic 1972 brutalist housing estate designed by Alison and Peter Smithson. Te camera pans vertically and horizontally along walkways and through the building, moving from one domestic interior to another to create a visual journey that addresses notions of home, memory and displacement within a physical structure on the verge of demolition. Suh was particularly drawn to the site’s ‘intangible quality’ as much as its architectural structure: the ‘energy, history, life and memory that has accumulated there’. Te exhibition culminates in a space


dedicated to Suh’s ongoing Perfect Home: Te Bridge Project, for which the artist, working with a team of architects, engineers,


programmers and animators, has developed a series of speculative prototypes for bridges that propose ways to connect his home in Seoul with his home in New York. Each bridge uses different technologies and structures to contend with issues of climate, geology, biodiversity and human activity. One runs over the Arctic, cutting a path through buildings and mountains, while another follows a straight path between the two cities. Te latter crosses the Pacific on a series of floating pods with special mechanisms designed to keep them stationary despite the ocean’s restless currents. Presented as an experimental lab within the gallery space, the project features drawings, animations, videos and specific environmental datasets covering ocean currents, tides, wind, temperature, precipitation, natural disasters, the migratory routes of aviary and marine life, and so on. Te plans also take into account geopolitical factors such as missile testing, as well as the migratory patterns of humans via air, land and ocean. It’s a fantastical project, whose imaginary links


between disparate places and cultures reflect Suh’s enduring interest in the relationship between identity and globalisation. With issues of migration and displacement


increasingly at the forefront of current affairs, Suh’s sculptures, drawings and videos seem more relevant than ever. Te pieces on show at Tate Modern ask profound questions about the nature of home and what it means to belong. Home, they suggest, is not a fixed place but a shifting, spectral presence – something that exists as much in memory as it does in reality. Te built environment is revealed as a witness to the traces left by those who inhabit it and, in Suh’s attempts to recreate and remember aspects of former and current homes, he demonstrates the impossibility of truly preserving something, whether a place, a moment in time or a memory. For anyone who has felt the pull of nostalgia or the upheaval of displacement, the artist’s works serve as a reminder that home is not just where we have come from, but something we carry within us.


PHOTOS: DO HO SUH


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