Passages

A tread layered drawing

“I see life as a passageway, with no fixed beginning or destination. We tend to focus on the destination all the time and forget about the in-between spaces.” – Do Ho Suh

For this assignment I have chosen the work of Do Ho Suh-Passage/s.

Passage/s is an art-installation spatial project consisting of a 1:1 translucent fabric structure organized as a passage trough spaces. The organization is structured and chaotic at the same time, blurring the boundaries between private and public. The artists states that his work is focused on the in-between spaces and our tendency to focus on the destination and forget about the beauty of the journey, the beauty of the Passage/s.

What fascinates me in this work was its fragility and its structural ability at the same time. Being semi-transparent and made out of fabric which overlaps depending on the view point and creates a color-overlay, the installation looks as a drawing in itself.

Having visited the piece in real life, I had a visual memory of how it felt as an experience, but yet no knowledge of its technical qualities and its structure. Therefor I started by re-drawing one of the pieces in detail, trying to understand the metal structure that stands behind the fabric and holds the pieces together. In this initial repetition I found it hard to distinguish which part stood in front and which-further away. I decided to focus on this challenge and divide the drawing into 3 layers according to how it was layered in the real world.

At that point however, I was still at the level of repetition. I had to find my own way of representing his work.

As I had already gone through decomposition of the layers in the drawing,

I decided to decompose the materials of which the installation was made as well. So fabric turned into tread. And I used this tread to redraw one part of Passage/s on translucent paper, dividing it in 3 layers to properly show the overlap and the spatial qualities of the project. My new way of drawing became more free and abstract than the initial drawings I made in Illustrator. I realized that there were no “wrong” and “right” lines while drawing with tread, as long as I respected the simple set of rules I had set for myself in the beginning. This technique allowed me to represent a 3D project in a 2D way while still including the materiality and overlay that I found so important in this installation piece.

My work became something between a drawing and a model. A passage from 2D to 3D perhaps.