All living creatures are... the same body, the same life and the same self, continually passing from form to form, from subject to subject, from existence to existence.
(Coccia, 2021)
All living creatures are... the same body, the same life and the same self, continually passing from form to form, from subject to subject, from existence to existence.
(Coccia, 2021)
Exhibition: MA Art and Ecology’s Degree Show
Venue: Studio B, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK
Year: 2023
The central sculpture, 齊物 (cai4 mat6), crafted from clays, lichens, and moulds, lives outdoors. Here, it blurs into its environment—snails, insects, butterflies, raindrops, and sunlight become one with the piece. Its title, 齊物, draws from Zhuangzi’s "Theory of all Equal Things" (齊物論): 'Heaven and earth were born at the same time I was, and the ten thousand things are one with me' (天地與我並生，萬物與我為一). Extending Scott F. Gilbert and Donna Haraway’s notion, "We are all lichens," my work corresponds with the ancient Daoist belief that humans exist as part of a greater whole among myriad more-than-human beings (萬物).
Complementing the sculpture, naturally dyed paper and willow charcoal drawings, created through processes like cobbling and Ichi-go ichi-e, are dispersed throughout the space. These rhizomatic works, alongside nine ceramic pieces titled "One and the same life", form assemblages that generate a metamorphic flow of being and non-being, reflecting the continuous transformation of all life forms.