The surface is a record, not an effect
The project imagines what remains eight centuries after a mythic conflict has ended. Temples collapse, fires go out and worship ceases. Masks move into theatre troupes, workshops, deserts, gates and abandoned houses. The lacquer surface carries each passage.
Gold and red mist suggest the beginning of a trial; aged copper belongs to its middle; old silver appears after the warmth has faded; white marks an end of ash, frost and dust. Teeth and face do not always age in the same sequence, so each physical work keeps its own combination of colour and wear.
Eight trials
The eight narrative routes are Theatre, Painting, Erosion, Wind, Smelting, War, Fire and Journey. Seven masks belong to figures encountered along the traveller’s route; the eighth is the traveller’s own face.
Project note: this is an independent lacquer reinterpretation based on mask imagery from the game Black Myth: Wukong and is not affiliated with the game’s official production. The “eight hundred years later” circulation, trials and object histories are fictional elements created for this series.
Workshop record
The process photographs preserve the masks as works in progress: grouped on the bench, handled from front and reverse, wiped, brushed and checked at close range.
