I deliberately try to find something concealed under the surface of the world, something we might associate with the idea of secrets. For instance, the state of a person in deep meditation is fascinating to me. Perhaps I am doomed, because of this habit to be an artist outside of those who care about major social problems, even less to be the sort of artist that leans towards more scholarly exercises. Intuition is a more powerful emotion than exploring ideas. Experience is more relied upon than knowledge.
Passion is paid attention to while reason is admired.
Since my early Dream Series and Notebook Series, to the current Family Series, I cannot deviate from the basic sense of introspection and privacy. I take them as important elements in my work because art should first be individual, then social. Of course it will revert back to an interest in individual after you have found your place in history. In his mid-20s, Ding Yi decided to spend his days bent over large canvases for hours and hours covering them each methodically and precisely with colorful pigments, which he randomly juxtaposed. Imposing his hard physical discipline upon himself, he cultivated a close relationship with the canvas, which might justly be considered a kind of meditation.