Buddhist figures that he found in Tibet. By using quasi-religious ritual, he seeks to discover the point at which the spiritual can manifest via the corporeal. He uses simple repetitive gestures, usually regarded as meaningless work-for-work's-sake chores. Buddhism, with its temple music, sculptures and philosophy are a prevalent theme in Zhang Huan's work. His sculpture Long Ear Ash Head (2007), for example, consists of a massive head made of incense ash and steel. It fuses the artist's image with the lengthened earlobes representing happiness and good fortune in the Buddhist religion. He continued to explore Buddhism with sculpture Sydney Buddha (2015), an exhibition where two Buddha sculptures were positioned facing each other: "One, a headless metal statue. The other, a crumbling sculpture made from over 20 tonnes of incense ash, which was collected from Buddhist temples in Shanghai and across China’s Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces." Of Sydney Buddha, the artist said: "The piece conveys the collective memory, soul, thoughts and prayers, and collapse of mankind. It implies a collective ineffectiveness, arising from taking action when none should be taken, upsetting the natural order of things." He has exhibited at shows including the 2002 Whitney Biennial and Rituals at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin. Zhang Huan’s Performance Art Angel (1993) Angel, one of Zhang Huan's first performance art pieces, dates back to 1993 at the National Art Gallery located in Beijing, China. Zhang placed a giant white canvas on the floor of the exhibition space, then stepped out of the exhibition area and had a jar of red liquid (supposed to represent blood) and mangled doll parts poured over him. Afterwards, Zhang picked up the doll pieces and walked back to the exhibition space and onto the canvas, where he then tried to reassemble the doll back together on the canvas. Thom Collins described the piece in a biographical writeup for the 2004 group exhibition Witness at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney: "This work, a startling and visceral commentary on the Chinese government mandate of abortions for women conceiving more than the legal limit of one child, led to a quick closure of the exhibition and serious censure of the artist." 12 Square Meters (1994) Zhang Huan grew up with the experience of living in a crowded village area. He did not have much space for himself, which impressed the idea of China's overpopulation on him at young age.