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Apple, Needle, and Disturbed

This essay is published in Art Review Oxford (ISSUE 12).

In early 2024, a one-minute video released by a WeChat account went viral in China. Although deceptively titled Wishing You Safe and Sound, the content displays how artist Liu Yaohua processed his ‘cruel experiment’ in his 2022 piece Disturbed, during the zero-Covid, by inserting needles into growing apples in the tree and surveilling their developing deformities. The visible Likes and Reposts reached a maximum of 100K+; click-through rate, checked by the account owner, was over 20 million. This data was collected from only one self-managed account on one social media platform. The actural viewers number could be hundreds of millions and beyond due to China’s colossal netizen population and swift spread. Seeing a conceptual art appreciated by such a vast audience is a phenomenon.

Liu Yaohua, Disturbed, 2022. Image Courtesy of the Artist.