New nomads negotiating canon

New Nomads face an identity crisis because of Globalism. Home is always tightly connected to one’s identity. Due to this continuous displacement of home, identity is influenced, and it is tough to have a stable personal representation. Walter Anderson explores identity shifts: “a post-modern person is a multi-community person, and his or her life as a social being is based on adjusting to shifting contexts and being true to divergent— and occasionally conflicting— commitments” (1995, p.128). Post-modern people are part of the multi-community, making it difficult to express themselves through communal identity due to their intersectional experiences. Identity can be considered fluid, depending on the situation a person is put into, based on which it can be transformed or abandoned. According to a contemporary theorist, a person can be considered as “performing” (Robertson & McDanie, 2012, p.54) based on the version of their identity they choose to show in different contexts.

multiple situations. Moreover, if interested in diversity, one can recognise internal differences within their community. This helps one recognise their sole traits, which guides them to a path where they can fight against the existing canons about groups of distinct individuals and establish their own identity, which is why, when western writers talk about identity, they refer to it as ones shif-ting identity along with their social and cultural presences (Robertson & McDaniel, 2012).

Hybridity is “a state of being, arrived at through the innovative mixing and borrowing of ideas, languages, and modes of practice” (Robertson & McDaniel, 2012, p.48).

It is the blending and synthesis of different cultures that come together voluntarily or as is the outcome of forced migration. A good example of forced hybridity is the imposition of one culture on another during colonisation. Such communities are often subjected to facing several western canons or stereotypes set by the western society to establish their own identity. Each individual represents their community and has to cross these obstacles to prove their distinctiveness.

Do Ho Suh’s exhibition always presented the rare opportunity of phy-sically seeing the homes of New York, Seoul, and Berlin (Leeum, 2012). In his work Fallen Star ⅕ (Suh, 2008 & 2011), Suh exhibiteda clash of spaces he had been through, where he constructed a collision of a traditional Korean house (Hanok) and a 19th-century American mansion at a one-fifth scale. These two buildings were smashed together and then split in half, where he filled the ground floor with debris. (Muchnic, 2009) This artwork demonstrated the battle between opposing cultures that the New Nomads try to survive to fit in this alien life created with set boundaries and stereotypes. The artist’s work showcases the difference between the social structure and culture while comparing the eastern and western architectural styles, highlighting the gap between them.

Living in New England, Suh intuitively perceived the vast differences between the 18th-century western-style architecture he found himself in and Hanok he had grown up in. In Hanok, a comparatively higher percentage of the surface is taken up by windows and doors than walls. These windows and doors covered with rice paper let light inside and help one hear, feel, and see changes in nature from inside the house, thus blurring the border between inside and outside. On the contrary, the western-style house built with thick walls creates an architectural situation in which the interior and the exterior are separated, and living with nature is hardly possible. (Leeum, 2012) By portraying the clash of the western, modern apartment and eastern, natural house, Suh successfully challenges the western canon based on his experience and identity.

Searching for home

What details make a “home”? Is home based on people, places, or objects? Or is it a feeling of belonging somewhere? Perhaps it can be considered a combination of them all.

In Suh's textile installations, he created replicas of his previous houses. To understand and highlight the meaning of “home”, he covered every inch of the interior with paper, rubbed it with blue charcoal, and created the textile sculpture with precision (Art21, 2022). As a result, all the houses in Hanok were suspended in the air (Suh, 2019), and the ones in New York were on the ground (Suh, 2016).

He explained that houses floating in the air represent memories, and maybe as time passes, all the houses will become a memory of once being home for him. This establishes that home is not just a building made of walls but the memories, feelings and experiences one carries, which make a place home. So even if the building fades, the memory remains intact.

This idea of home is where one feels one belongs, hel-ping to stabilise the identity of an immigrant in a foreign space. It becomes much easier for people to find and accept theselves when they feel they belong. This artwork installs one’s “personal space” (home) in a “public space” (exhibition) and allow strangers in. In a way, this installation reminds the audience of the identity crisis New Nomads are going through due to displacements.

Conclusion

Suh constantly presented the construction of a building for a specific location, as well as the work of moving the personal memories permeated in the building to another space. It was an expression of one’s life, but it also revealed the identity of modern people who were nomadic and globalised. Moreover, it further suggested the direction in which people should move forward: collecting the memories and carrying them wherever they go. Searching for the meaning of home is not just finding a place to stay. It gives answers to the questions: “How will an individual try to find and stabilise their identity in this modern society?”, “Where do they belong in this constantly changing globalised era?”

To conclude this essay with Do Ho Suh’s interview, he said, “The common misunderstanding is that my work is a confrontation, a clash of cultures. It’s not really about that. It’s more about interdependency and the way things coexist. That’s what I’m interested in: how to survive and blend in. It’s an ongoing process.” (Muchnic, 2009)

This essay whose ideation formed the basis of the exhibition, was written by Alice Kim. @anemone_kim

Fig.10 S Suh, D. (2011) Fallen Star. [Water colour and coloured pencil on paper]. Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul.

Kim, A. (2023) Stitching Borders: Questioning the life of New Nomads and searching for the meaning of home through Do Ho Suh’s architectural installations. University of the Arts London.