Yang Chihung immigrated alone to America to develop alongside the most popular artists from around the world in New York, a mark of his determination and courage. In 1984 he became the first person of Chinese descent to win top honors at the P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center. In 2000, out of a wish to be like a sculptor with powerful formative abilities, he began attempting to carve shapeless, intangible time, scaling down its traces in his work. His creations are like carving in time, and his works are the most concrete form of evidence for its passing. His painstaking efforts were all just to leave something real, a stroke, a line, a trace. Any artwork springs from the hand of the artist, so behind every masterpiece is the soul of a great artist. What really moves us are the irreplaceable ideas and spirit behind the artwork.

This work, "Growth and Decay", reflects Yang's profound, detached insights about life. Yang keeps many plants and bonsai trees in his studios; it is like his own little universe, which he uses to present life in its different stages of growth and withering. Most people view caring for plants as simply the act of caring for plants, but Yang Chihung sees more than just the flourishing and withering of plants. In the various stages of the plants' lives, Yang can see the imaginative ways in which life persists and passes. This imbues his works with the shadows of time's passing in a way that allows people to feel the temperature of the passage of time. Beauty is the secret of life. It exists not only in the eye, but also within Yang's art.