Dust to Dust, 2010
2 monoprints on paper
each: 46 × 69 cm, 67 × 141 cm
Courtesy of the artist and Zeno X Gallery
The installation Dust to Dust encompasses fifty drawings that replicate photographs depicting political events and popular uprisings from around the world. Each drawing is based on a newspaper or magazine photograph, which establishes a relationship to a broader and recent history of protest.
The two drawings presented in Spring of Democracy are based on details from photographs taken by the photojournalist Kyung- taek Na. One depicts a confrontation between paratroopers and civilians at Geumnam street on May 20, 1980. The other drawing is based on a photograph taken on May 15, 1980, when students of Chonnam National University confronted riot police at the university’s main gate—a pivotal moment, which spurred the May 18 Movement. In Suciu’s process, the recuperated images draw to the fore details such as the individual facial features of civilian protestors, while blurring perpetrators into a mass mob.
Mircea Suciu (b. 1978, Romania) works with different materials such as acrylic and oil and often combines them with monoprint techniques. His works are based on images he finds in newspapers, magazines and other media. Fascinated by what he describes as “the absurd actions of man,” Suciu’s work explores existential and psychological aspects of the human condition. His recent solo exhibitions include Mircea Suciu: Universal Fatigue (Blain Southern, New York, 2020) and The Fracture (National Museum of Contemporary Art, Bucharest, 2017). His work has also been featured in group exhibitions such as Trouble in Paradise: Collection Rattan Chadha (Kunsthal Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2019), Feeling Called Love. Collection of an Idiot (Kunstmuseum Bochum, Germany, 2019) and La Brique, The Brick, Cărămida (La Kunsthalle Mulhouse, France, 2019).