Although many of the artworks in We the People: New Art from the Collection address the question of what it means to be a citizen today by exploring how we relate to other people, both in our own communities and across the globe, some approach this issue more obliquely, through our connection to nature.
Sopheap Pich (Cambodian, born 1971). Cycle, 2011. Bamboo, wire, and glue; 116 x 165 1/2 x 24 1/2 inches (294.6 x 420.4 x 62.2 cm). Collection Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York; Gift of Mrs. Georgia M. G. Forman, by exchange, 2014 (2014:4). © 2011 Sopheap Pich
Sopheap Pich shapes his sculpture using bamboo (as is the case in Cycle), rattan, burlap culled from rice bags, and other materials that speak to the daily interactions between the landscape and its residents in Southeast Asia. Pich currently lives and works in Cambodia: the home country he and his family were forced to flee decades prior during a period of civil war. In Cycle, the artist twisted a gridded bamboo armature into an organ-like shape that alludes to the body in both its form and resiliency under pressure.
