Sofia’s Seoul
Board, paper, paint, ink
33 x 95 x 34 in
83.8 x 241.3 x 86.4 cm
2012
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Sofia’s Seoul by Richard Humann draws inspiration from the film Lost in Translation, which follows a traveler navigating the disorientation and isolation of being far from home in an unfamiliar culture. Humann’s own experience living in South Korea during an extended artist residency provided a personal context for exploring the uncertainties of language, cultural difference, and communication.
For the installation, Humann used an online translation program to translate English text into Hangul, the Korean writing system. He then printed a transcript of dialogue from the film and cut it apart, letter by letter. The translation program converted most of the English text into Hangul but left some English words and letters untranslated, exposing the limitations and inconsistencies of the software. These failures mirror, metaphorically, the process of adapting to a new culture, where familiar ways of communicating and understanding the world do not always translate seamlessly. Humann used the fragmented characters to construct the title Sofia’s Seoul on the sculpture’s pedestal, creating what he describes as a “perfectly wrong” translation.
The process turns translation into both a linguistic experiment and a metaphor for cultural displacement. Meaning becomes fragmented as words pass between languages and systems of interpretation, revealing how easily communication can shift, remain incomplete, or lose its intended sense. The mixture of Hangul and English embodies the experience of encountering unfamiliar signs and sounds while struggling to establish a clear understanding of one’s surroundings.
Like the film that inspired it, Sofia’s Seoul considers the distance between intention and understanding. Humann transforms the limitations of digital translation into a visual expression of the uncertainty of living between cultures, where miscommunication is not simply a failure, but an experience that reveals the limits of language and the complexity of human connection.
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul (detail) • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul (detail) • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul (detail) • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Richard Humann • Sofia’s Seoul (detail) • Board, paper, paint, ink • 33 x 95 x 34 in • 2012
Photo credits: Rizwan Mirza / Richard Humann Studio