Homepage: www.suwonlee.com
SUNDIAL FOR YOUR MIGRATORY STATUS
In my series How to Measure Time (2021), I explore the notion of time and its relationship to the experience of being. Time is not a linear, but a circular and cyclical experience. We start out at one place and often find ourselves going back to the same situation over and over again: we are migrating at one moment and then become residents, but nothing guarantees that we won´t migrate again. Our life situations and legal statuses change constantly throughout our lives, as life is an endless process of transformation and adaptation. For En Tránsito 2024, my proposal to be exhibited at El Faro de Ses Coves Blances – Sa Antoni de Portmany, is a version of the piece Stranger/Undocumented turned into a sundial. Different migratory statuses such as “asylum seeker”, “non-resident alien”, “in transit” and “tourist” replace the hours in a clock. The sunlight tells a different migratory status with each passing moment. The ephemeral and impermanent nature of being and the illusion of the legal system is made evident. With this piece, I hope that the audience can feel connected, reflect and transcend the fleeting nature of these labels established by the legal systems implemented between countries and to help think of ourselves and others as thinking and sentient beings that deserve respect regardless of our legal status.
Above: sundial model
Left: “Stranger/Undocumented”,
2021 (original work)
Bio
Suwon Lee (Caracas, 1977) is an artist of Korean descent belonging to the recent Venezuelan diaspora and currently residing in Madrid. She has had solo exhibitions in Caracas, Madrid, and Seoul. Her international group exhibitions include the Museum of Modern Art in New York (2023), the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid (2021), the Guangzhou Image Triennial curated by Gerardo Mosquera (2021), at the Vincent Price Museum, USA (2018), Arizona State University Art Museum, USA (2017), Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemporain, Paris, France (2013), Amparo Museum, Puebla, Mexico (2014), IX Mercosur Biennial (2013), Biennial of the Americas: Draft Urbanism, USA (2013), and many other shows in the United States, Brazil, Venezuela, Panama, Spain, Colombia, Chile, Seoul, and Paris, among others. Her works are in the collections of MoMA New York (USA), Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Collection (USA), Banco Mercantil Collection (Venezuela), CIFO Miami, Museu de Arte Brasileira da Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado (Brazil), and various private collections in Venezuela, Colombia, the United States, Spain, Germany, Costa Rica, Argentina, and Puerto Rico.