As the most concentrated retrospective exhibition since the establishment of The JIANGS, “THE JIANGS PRESENTS—LANDSCAPE: Excavation and Creation” originates from an investigation on its more than ten years’ art-making, and also from Jiang Sheng’s journey to retrace his steps to the birthplace and enclave of Buddhist art—the ancient Gandhara region. This expedition provides a complete clue for Jiang Sheng’s creation, and reshaped a new balance between his statue and spiritual communication. The exhibition is divided into four connecting chapters: Excavation, Creation, Symbols, and Medium, altogether concocting more than ten sculptures, over ten vessels, low reliefs, and other new works, and presenting the original materials and textual research archives on image-making techniques conducted by The JIANGS.

“The vast changes in time and space always made image-making of a specific era a project of inevitability. In the exhibition, Jiang Sheng retraces his steps to ancient Gandhara culture where the Buddha statues were first made, and to complete his task of elucidating its inevitability.”

The name “Being IN THE OPEN FIELD” comes from the teachings of Qiu Yang Chongba Rinpoche. In an imaginary land, “there are no mountains or trees, completely open, like a monotonous desert without any features, and that is our true face. We are very simple and primitive.” After conscious participation, people’s clear, pure, and powerful true faces begin to separate, just like “a grain of sand in the desert stretches out its neck and looks around. We are that grain of sand, with the idea of separating from the desert.”