YoO was born in a city in northern China where ceramics production has been the pillar industry for centuries. As a child, he was intrigued by the crude, damaged, unfinished paintings and the unique decorative patterns on the ruins commonly found in the city. They demonstrated the development of art for him and had a profound influence on his later practice. Curator Sun Qidong attributes YoO’s art-making to a "Gaia" style of creative practice, which "seeks to realize his communication, negotiation, and dialogue with nature so as to gain force in a dynamic situation". Despite its emphasis on interconnection, the hierarchical, dichotomous, or centralist mindset under an outdated global order is still insufficient to grasp the dynamic force of life. YoO’s practice "allows the Qin Mountains to re-emerge from a concrete, closed locality as the 'Gaia' in motion, thus providing us with an opportunity to rethink and re-articulate the 'clash of civilizations' under the new, networked global order". The Qin Mountains, as Gaia, are no longer associated with the traditional connotations of harmony, nurture, and nourishment, but are rife with undercurrents of contradiction and conflict. The Qin Mountains are the personification of the force of life.