Do Ho Suh: Perfect Home 21st Century Museum, Kanazawa, Japan. Polyester fabric, metal armature, 420 x 7239 x 244 cm. Installation view

Artist Do Ho Suh has made a monumental emperor’s robe from thousands of soldiers’ dog tags and precariously perched a fully furnished house on the edge of a roof seven stories up. He has used his personal history of wearing uniforms—from schoolboy to soldier—as the basis for a self-portrait, and set an army of tiny figurines under a glass floor, inviting viewers to walk on the artwork without necessarily even realizing it.

Suh says: “Everything starts from an idea of personal space—what is the dimension of personal space, what makes a person a person, and when does a person become a group? What is interpersonal space—space between people?”

Do Ho Suh asks questions in his work. I think the most interesting approach for us, the viewers, are to do the same, ask these questions – and others – to the work, and to ourselves. The point is not to find an answer, but the process of discovering new insights as we go along.

In my work, I can let other people see things differently …

Do Ho Suh

Do Ho Suh: Perfect Home, 21st Century Museum, Kanazawa, Japan (detail)

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Do Ho Suh: b. 1962 in Seoul, Korea. Educated in Korea and USA. Extensive exhibition activity, including the Venice biennial 2001, Sidney biennial 2002 and Istanbul bienniale 2003. Solo exhibitions among others at the Whitney Museum, N.Y. 2001, the Artsonje Center in Korea 2003 and Serpentine Gallery, London 2005. Represented in a number of public collections, including MOMA, S. Guggenheim and Walker Art Centre. Art project for the Public Art Fund in N.Y 1998-2000. Suh is represented by the Gallery Lehmann Laupin in New York.