My fundamental attachment: Marcel Duchamp

If there is one single artist in human history that ever touched me deeply and influenced me without me being aware of the expressions of such an impact, this artist would be Marcel Duchamp, the most influential yet controversial figure of the 20th century.

From the first glimpse, my meticulous painting style has nothing to do with Duchamp's playful manipulation of objects. If I were forced to find some similarities between our styles, I would pick out Duchamp's early cubist paintings as a remote source of my interest in the dissembling and reassambling of human bodies. Or maybe my earlier practice of incorporating physical objects into my paintings. Or maybe my sneaky interest in sexuality and erotism. Or maybe my use of collage as a starting point for paintings...

But that's not the end of my attachment to Duchamp. I would often feel that Duchamp's works speak to me, even though I hate them at an aesthetical level. There is something magic about Duchamp's works(or thoughts, you can call them) that draws people in, that compels everyone to dig deeper and deeper and boom...serendipity.

It is the serendipity that attracts me. Duchamp's art is one mystery within another, none is impenetrable, yet none is so transparent. Reading Duchamp is like a scavenger hunt, understanding one line of his text leads to the pondering of a riddle hidden in another line.

That is what I want to achieve in my own art: create a maze that attracts people without frustrating them, a mystery that excites them with serendipity but compels them to keep wondering.