The instruction created by Zheng Bo literally invites one to disconnect: to turn off their phone and concentrate on the silence and the surrounding plants. In an instructional text written in both Mandarin and English, Zheng proposes direct communion between the interpreter of the instruction and a plant, which the participant should choose, as if by attraction, in a subjective way: a grass that speaks to them.

By emphasizing the living character of the plant, he implicitly invites the viewer to draw it before burying the drawing in the ground and letting the microbes break it down. The artist invites us to change our relationship with the plant and to go beyond the conventions of drawing. It is not a question here of “being able” to draw or knowing the name of the plant, but of sharing a moment, of sharing the sheet of paper that ends up back in the ground. This convivial moment with the plant also offers the possibility of reconnecting with the earth or rather perhaps as Zheng highlights on his instagram account: to #returntoearth.