Dancing People 1989

Se-Ok Suh made Dancing People with ink, using a brush to apply rhythmical strokes to the paper. I can almost feel him at work. The brushstrokes vary between thick and thin, creating a sense of movement. The ink bleeds slightly into the paper, giving the image a soft, ethereal quality. The dancing figures seem to emerge from the paper itself, as if they are spirits taking shape before our eyes. The upper, arcing stroke is confident, and the ovoid shape connects to the vertical line below with a sensitive touch. What kind of dance is this? What kind of feeling? It reminds me of some of Brice Marden's calligraphic work. These dancers are in conversation with each other across time and space. Thinking and feeling are fused in the brushstrokes, like a form of notation. It’s like an ongoing jam session, each artist riffing on the ideas of those who came before, each stroke a response to a question, a variation on a theme. Dancing people, dancing lines, a dance of art itself.