Doris Salcedo is a Colombian artist, born in 1958 in Bogota. She completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1980 at Jorge Tadeo Lozano University then traveled to New York for a Master of Fine Arts degree. Later she returned to her hometown of Bogota to teach at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Chairs is an installation made of 1,550 old chairs crammed into a relatively small space between two buildings in Istanbul. Salcedo created this work for the 8th International Istanbul Biennale. The placement of the installation in public space was to allow for extensive coverage.

Salcedo’s work addresses the question of forgetting and memory, which is apparent in her installation of 1550 chairs. In Chairs, she takes a stack of chairs and transforms them into memorials, particularly for the history of migration and displacement in the city of Istanbul.

Salcedo’s works evoke numerous impressions after a first look, but unlike other mysterious artworks, Chairs provide answers. The approach she takes to present these messages are distinct and bold, although she uses everyday household items like chairs.