Soft Concrete 2012

Kishio Suga made ‘Soft Concrete’ with steel and concrete, but I don’t know when. The combination of rigid steel and wet concrete plays with our expectations of these materials. The concrete oozes out around the steel frame, as if the metal were sinking into quicksand. There's a tension between the hard industrial materials and the loose, almost liquid way they come together. Look closely at how the concrete pools and spreads, creating a landscape that feels both accidental and inevitable. It’s like watching a slow-motion collapse, or maybe even a birth. Suga wasn’t trying to hide the process of how the artwork was made. On the contrary, he embraces the mess and chance. This work reminds me of Richard Serra's heavy steel sculptures, but Suga's piece has a vulnerability that is all its own. It captures a fleeting moment, a conversation between opposing forces, and in its stillness, it makes me wonder about the nature of change and the beauty of impermanence.