Apple 苹果

Creator(s)

Shao-Xiang WU 吴少湘

Preview

Date

1991

Format

Photograph

Location of Exhibition Event

Münze Austria, Vienna

Materials

shilling coins, brass

Dimensions

180 cm high

Description

This is a work by Wu Shao-Xiang created during his emigration to Austria, marking a thematic turn from expressing sexuality to criticizing the money worship. It consists of Schilling coins meticulously glued row by row. In the story of Adam and Eve, the apple represents temptation and the objectification of human desire. This gilded apple appears clinquant and fleshy on the outside but is actually hollow inside—an analogy for “all that glitters is rotten," (金玉其外，败絮其中). Human desire has been replaced by the image or representation of desire. (Zhuocheng Jiang '26)