【CONCEPT】
The cicada is a wonderful insect. It can burrow deep into the dark ground and hibernate there for 17 years, where the nymph continuously shedding its old self and over and over gaining new life growing inch by inch, until it completely breaks through the soil and emerges. Its molted exoskeleton continues to cling tightly to the tree truck and it puts all its passion into singing. Exchanging 17 years of hibernation for a month of life is very intriguing. The concept behind creating this work “Zen” went beyond a realistic depiction of vitality to attain a more contemplative stage of spiritual teaching. The praise heaped on the ant sculpture exhibition won renown and attention, which was exciting, and challenged me to try something more difficult and abstruse and deepen my creative capabilities. Settling down my mind and reading the Prajñ_p_ramit_ H_daya S_tra, quieting engaging in Buddhist meditation every day, after many years and diligent thought, I resolved to come up with an exploratory series completely different than the ant series in which a self-expression style would magnificently take shape and in which the ideas would incorporate enormous changes and complications. The round-bodied cicada cannot be fully conveyed in art, so I did not sculpt a completely original appearance, rather in the round entity, there is still a hibernating cicada nymph. Is it other worldly or of this world? Is it entering this perfect life without regret or it is still relying on live to leave the broken circle? Is it a cicada? Zen? Is it hiding? Is it stopping? Is it resting? Is it relaxed and free? When the observer is not of a mind to categorize, the Zen significance is in the judgment of propriety.

【INTRODUCTION】
Slowly shaping a complete branch of boxwood into an 11 cm diameter sphere with resorting to use of a compass or tape measure; instead, relying solely on the creator’s unhindered concentration to fully bring out the original minute grain and eye-catching pigment yellow hue of the boxwood is difficult, very difficult! Even more astonishing is that getting up close and using a magnifying class to minutely inspect the high-caliber woodcarving technique reveals that, with thickness of only one-third of a sheet of newsprint, the transparency of the cicada’s wings that are used to make noise is fully manifested and the pattern of veins on the thin wings match consistently from top to bottom and inside to outside, and the appearance of the cicada’s tiny body is ingeniously proportional to the spread of its wings. This is Wu Ching’s most complete and perfect representative piece from 1986. Similarly, its abstract expression of leaving the world and entering it is sophisticated, insightful and boundlessly elegant.  

Exhibitions ＊ May 1986‒May 1987 National Palace Museum, Taipei, “Modern Art Experimental Exhibition” ＊ June 29, 1987‒June 29, 1988 National Palace Museum, Taipei ＊ October 1991 Taipei Fine Arts Museum “Wu Ching Gold Sculpture Grand Exhibition” ＊ October 1992‒1993 Wu Ching Exhibition, Apollo Art Gallery ＊ April 1, 1997‒October 15, 1997 National Palace Museum (Fate Passion Series 4 works) ＊ March 2003 “Wu Ching’s Sculpture World” touring exhibition throughout northern, central and southern Taiwan at the invitation of the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Cultural and Educational Foundation ＊ 2004 ABN AMRO Bank Exhibition ＊ May 2004 Chiayi Municipal Museum, “Wu Ching 2004 Sculpture Art Exhibition” ＊ 2006 Xingang, Chiayi County Cultural and Educational Foundation ＊ 2007 National Center for Traditional Arts “Nationwide Wood Sculpture United Exhibition”