Life, Entangled: Artist Liang Shaoji on Working with Silkworms Favorite 

Practitioner: 

Date: 

Jul 30 2019

Location: 

Shanghai

“I am a silkworm.” Liang Shaoji has repeatedly used this phrase to describe his work, underscoring his preoccupation with the materiality of silk and the technology of sericulture, or silk farming. For more than twenty-five years, Liang Shaoji has raised silkworms and trained them to spin silk onto different objects in his Nature series.

For the work Chains: The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Nature Series, No. 79, Liang covered hollow metal chains in delicate, raw white silk. Here, the silkworms not only create the material but also become live participants—stand-ins for the artist. Liang blurs the boundaries between his role as an artist and the worms with whom he co-creates this artwork, opening larger questions on the distinction between art and nature. Furthermore, his fascination with silk is rooted in the Chinese psyche: Chinese legends connect the invention of silk-making with the creation of Chinese civilization. It is said that the Yellow Emperor, Huangdi, or his wife, Lady Xiling, actually discovered the method of raising silkworms and spinning silk.

“The relationship between the silk and the metal chain here is one of dependence . . . they depend on each other, but also conflict with each other.”
—Liang Shaoji

External sources: 

https://theallureofmatter.org/artists/liang-shaoji/
Posted by phxxnico on Mar 11 2024

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Effectiveness

How does this project help?

Activates (people)Energizes and organizes people into action. Can include emotion work
Shifts (culture)Shifts the cultural landscape in order to imagine and enable change.

Timeframe For change

This project seems to be part of a campaign with a clear long-term goal. Long-term goals tend to be things like: end racism; end homophobia; make the sun stand still in the sky. A campaign with a long-term goal also needs to have some kind of theory of change.
Liang Shaoji chooses silk as the medium to express a "comprehensive inquiry" into history, culture, the microscopic world, and life. The aim is to explore the larger universe from the microcosm of silkworms and cocoons, and to explore the meaning of life, interpreting current thoughts through the intrinsic spirit of silk.

Notes

This project, through two drastically different materials and the creative method of "wrapping," evokes the form of "sacrificial rites" in traditional culture. Influenced by Milan Kundera, Liang Shaoji presents a profound and substantial essence in a light and gentle manner. This conveys an idea to people: the tiny silkworm consumes its own life to wear down the imprisoning industrial machinery.