Résumé:

Xu Bing has made a new installation using dust collected in the aftermath of September 11th 2001 when the world trade Centre collapsed. He makes reference to how lower Manhattan became covered with a fine whitish-grey film. The outline of a Zen Buddhist poem is visible, revealed as if letters have been removed from under the dust layer:

The Bodhi (True Wisdom) is not like the tree;
The mirror bright is nowhere shining;
As there is nothing from the first,
Where does the dust itself collect?

This was written as the true expression of Zen faith by Hui-neng (638-713), traditionally considered the Sixth Patriarch of the Zen sect in China and therefore a much revered figure. It was written in response to another poem by a Zen monk who claimed to understand the faith in all its purity:

The body is the Bodhi tree;
The soul is like the mirror bright,
Take heed to keep it always clean,
And let no dust collect upon it.

In the work Xu Bing discusses the relationship between the materials world and the spiritual world, and the complicated circumstances created by different world perspectives. He collected the dust a few streets away from the devastated site and made it into a small figure in order to carry it through customs and thus to other places.