Gordon Cheung started working with a state of the art porcelain 3d printing company, in the porcelain Capital of China, Jingdezhen to explore the intersection of a disruptive technology considered to be a pillar of the fourth industrial revolution with traditional craft. His existing financial newspaper sculptures were 3d scanned through photogrammetry and simplified into lower polygon shapes to highlight the notion of a digital landscape that was then 3d printed in porcelain. For Gordon, the polygons represent the atom of the 3d modeling space just as the 2d digital space is represented by the pixel.

The ancient symbolism of clay as the material from which humanity is formed has always fascinated Gordon. These human origin myths, from Mesopotamia to China, reveal a deep connection between humanity and the earth. Gods like Enki in Mesopotamia and Prometheus in Greek mythology shape humans from clay. In Chinese mythology, the goddess Nüwa is said to have formed the first humans from yellow clay, breathing life into her creations. These myths highlight our intrinsic link to the earth, with clay symbolizing transformation, life, the cyclical nature of existence and as a cornerstone in the development of civilization.

In Gordon Cheung's scholar rock sculptures, he uses 3D-printed porcelain technology to bring these ancient themes into a contemporary context. Scholar rocks, or gongshi, have been revered in Chinese culture as objects of contemplation, representing the harmony between nature and artifice. Traditionally, these rocks were valued for their naturally occurring shapes, which evoke landscapes or mountainous forms, serving as microcosms of the larger natural world and by developing the scholar rocks into 3d-printed digitized porcelain forms Gordon is embodying a philosophical exploration of creation, transformation, and human nature fluctuating in a natural and artificial world - humanity’s relationship to nature and the digital landscapes of our modernity.