Tree Stumps 树桩

In order to beautify the environment, the university fabricated a bunch of what looks like sawed-off tree stumps out of cement. Both big and smalls trees were copied — they’re quite real looking — and then they used these cement stumps as fences, benches, etc. It gives people the impression that there was once a forest here, but now it has all been cut down leaving the stumps all over the place. This is what’s called teaching through the environment. These tree stumps lead me to believe that a constituency of lumberjacks runs this university.

July, 1999

Yu Jian 于坚
from Brown-cover Notebook - Loose-leaf Binder