Do Ho Suh (b. 1962, Seoul, Korea; lives and works in London) works across various media, creating drawings, film, and sculptural works that confront questions of home, physical space, displacement, memory, individuality, and collectivity. Suh is best known for his fabric sculptures that reconstruct to scale his former homes in Korea, Rhode Island, Berlin, London, and New York. Suh is interested in the malleability of space in both its physical and metaphorical forms, and examines how the body relates to, inhabits, and interacts with that space. He is particularly interested in domestic space and the way the concept of home can be articulated through architecture that has a specific location, form, and history. For Suh, the spaces we inhabit also contain psychological energy, and in his work he makes visible those markers of memories, personal experiences, and a sense of security, regardless of geographic location.
Suh received a BFA in painting from Rhode Island School of Design in 1994 and an MFA in sculpture from Yale University in 1997. Solo exhibitions of his work have recently been organized at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (2019) Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK (2019); Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, The Netherlands (forthcoming, 2019); ARoS, Aarhus, Denmark (2018); The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY (2018); Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, TN (2018); Towada Art Center, Towada (2018); Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC (2018); Cantor Arts Center, Stanford, CA (2018); Bildmuseet, Umea, Sweden (2017); Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, WI (2017); NC-arte, Bogotá, Colombia (2016); Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, CA (2016); Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH (2016); Singapore Tyler Print Institute, Singapore (2015); Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, OH (2015); Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2015); Bristol Museum & Art Gallery, Bristol, United Kingdom (2015); The Contemporary Austin, TX (2014); National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul (2013); 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan (2012-2013); Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan (2012); Stuart Collection, University of San Diego, California (2012); Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul (2012); and Tate Modern, London (2011). Select group exhibitions featuring his work include, When Home Won’t Let You Stay: Migration Through Contemporary Art, Iris and Gerald B. Cantor Center for the Visual Arts at Stanford University, Stanford, CA (2021); Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN (2020); Institute of Contemporary Art Boston, Boston, MA (2019); Waking Dream, Ruby City, San Antonio, TX (2019); Crossing Lines, Constructing Home: Displacement and Belonging in Contemporary Art, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, MA (2019); Altering Home, 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art & Culture City of East Asia, Kanazawa, Japan (2018); Shelter in the Storm, A Look at the Exile in the MUSAC Collection, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y Léon, León, Spain (2018); Freespace, Japan Pavilion, 16th International Architecture Exhibition, Venice, Italy (2018); Art of the Senses, Albright-Knox Gallery, Buffalo, NY (2017); No Place Like Home, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem (2017); Apparitions: Frottages and Rubbings from 1860 to Now, The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, traveled to the Menil Collection, Houston, TX (2015); Beyond and Between, Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul (2014); Shades of Time: An Exhibition from the Archive of Korean American Artists, Part Two 1989 - 2001, Queens Museum, NY (2014); Homebodies, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2013); Dislocation, Daegu Art Museum, South Korea (2012); and Peppermint Candy: Contemporary Korean Art, The National Museum of Contemporary Art, Gwacheon, South Korea (2009). Suh has participated in multiple biennial exhibitions, including the Chicago Architecture Biennial (2019), Singapore Biennial (2016); the 9th Gwangju Biennale, South Korea (2012); the 6th Liverpool Biennial, United Kingdom (2010); the 12th International Architecture Exhibition, Venice, Italy (2010); the 8th International Istanbul Biennial (2003); the 13th Biennial of Sydney (2002); and represented Korea at the 49th Venice Biennale (2001).
His work is in numerous international public and private collections, including 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan; Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; Art Gallery of Ontario, Ontario, Canada; Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD; Bard College Museum, Annandale-on Hudson, NY; Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY; Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH; Daegu Museum of Art, Daegu, South Korea; Garage CCC, Moscow, Russia; Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; Gwangju Biennale Foundation, Gwangju, Korea; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN; Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel; Linda Pace Foundation, San Antonio, TX; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León, León, Spain; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Museum Voorlinden, Netherlands; National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece; National Museum of Contemporary Art, Gwacheon, Korea; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA; Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence, RI; San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, TX; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA; Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; Tate, London, United Kingdom; Vera List Center for Art and Politics, The New School, New York, NY; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; and the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT.
In 2013, Do Ho Suh was named Wall Street Journal Magazine's Innovator of the Year in Art.