Doris Salcedo

 

 

Born in 1958 in Bogotá, Colombia, Doris Salcedo is a contemporary sculpture artist working on themes of memory, violence, and hierarchies. Salcedo began her career in the late-1980s by thinking through abstract forms that could monumentalize violence, particularly that inflicted by the state. Collaborating with architects and engineers, Salcedo conceives of her structures as odes to the victims of senseless violence. Growing up in Bogotá, Salcedo had first-hand experience of the ways in which war cements itself in the mundane and consumes all aspects of citizens lives. War is often conceived of as a global phenomenon including one or more countries, but Salcedo conceives of war as multivalent and having both internal and external implications. 

 

Salcedo’s practice is highly meditative and occupied with globality in a contemporary sense. While the war in Colombia was a civil war its reverberations can be felt all over the globe. The Colombia Civil War connects to a long history of political violence, troubled economy, and weak government structure. The beginnings of the civil war are highly disputed, but the devastating effects are clear. The violence and drug trafficking in Colombia have its connections with the United States, certain multinational corporations such as United Fruit Company, and Cuba. 

 

The Untitled chair sculpture hones in on a material and figural absence that Salcedo continually investigates. Salcedo appropriated a domestic object to channel her concerns about state violence. The stainless-steel chair was originally a wax model cast in New York. The surface of the chair bear marks of distress and the very structure is disorienting.