Manufactured Sanity 2025-2026

Disposable paper vessels—from flat paper plates to the three-dimensional craft of an instant cup noodle—serve as the ultimate substrates for a hyper-accelerated consumer culture. Upon these fleeting, mass-produced items, heavily layered traditional rock pigments are superimposed alongside pristine, vibrant pop icons and cartoon personas. They bear a uniform, fabricated expression: a carefully engineered social smile. This is our manufactured sanity—the polished, standardized mask required to navigate a frantic, commercialized world.

Yet, this superficial sanity is violently disrupted. Subjected to scorching heat, the fragile paper substrates are eaten away by fire, leaving raw, charred voids and cratered, volcanic textures.

By trapping these engineered identities between the eternal permanence of natural minerals and paper vessels designed for immediate disposal, the series confronts a culture obsessed with velocity—where even three minutes is deemed too slow. The scorched edges and exposed fractures reveal the psychological toll of the assembly line: a deep existential crisis bubbling just beneath the surface of the convenience we consume, proving that our carefully constructed facades are always just one spark away from returning to ash.