“What is my “Creator” like?”
Yining Liang has used a collection of jewellery to explore his personal faith: “The inspiration of this work comes from the ‘God’ I think exists. For me, the making process is like questioning one’s own beliefs.” Liang’s research focussed on ancient Chinese gods and beasts, encouraging him to reflect on his own beliefs: “I am a man without religious belief, but at the same time, I believe in the existence of the creator, who is different from all the religious gods in the world.”
According to recent surveys, 43% of Chinese religious believers have a primary school education or below, and only 5% have a university degree or above with about 80% of college students recording no religious beliefs. Liang surveyed his own cohort, finding 70% not practicing any religion, but still believing in the existence of God. In exploring his own image of the creator, Liang employs lines, representations of multidimensional space, interweaving different planes of time and space, one dimensional marks that also create three dimensional space.