A Father-Son Bet Inspired a Porcelain Masterpiece With 6 Billion Views

Standing before a white porcelain sculpture at Shanghai's WorldSkills Museum, visitors lean in for a closer look.

Princess Yushu appears to be wrapped in flowing silk, with a translucent veil floating around her and fine strands of hair falling across her shoulders. Yet every detail – the clothing, the hair and the figure itself – was made from porcelain.

The sculpture, titled Myth, has generated more than 6 billion views across Chinese social media platforms, according to Youth Daily. But it began not as an attempt to create an online sensation, but as a wager between porcelain artist Lian Deli and his rebellious teenage son.

Lian's son had excelled in middle school and gained admission to a leading high school. After entering high school, however, he became absorbed in online games and frequently skipped classes to visit Internet cafes.

During the boy's final school year, a call from his teacher triggered another fierce argument.

"If you don't want to study, then come and make white porcelain with me," Lian told him.

His son fired back that there was nothing impressive about his father's work.

"Your pieces are too old-fashioned. I don't like them at all," he said.

The remark stung. Lian was an artistic director working with Dehua white porcelain, a craft with a history of more than 1,000 years. But instead of dismissing his son's opinion, he asked what kind of art might appeal to him.

The teenager described a tall, slim figure with a high nose and pointed to Princess Yushu, a character in the 2005 fantasy film The Myth.

"If you can make Princess Yushu, I'll go back to school and study properly," he said.

Lian accepted the challenge.

Recreating the character's weightless veil in porcelain proved particularly difficult. Lian tested different clay formulas more than 100 times before finding one that could be rolled into extremely thin sheets without breaking during firing.

His son watched his father fail and start again. Lian said the persistence gradually changed the boy's attitude.

When the sculpture's first prototype emerged successfully from the kiln, the teenager kept his side of the bargain. He returned to school, prepared for the university entrance examination and was later admitted to the National University of Defense Technology.

The bet also changed Lian's career. He and his wife later started a business and continued refining the technique, eventually securing a national invention patent for their high-strength, thin-bodied porcelain.

In the finished sculpture, Princess Yushu's porcelain clothing is just 0.2 millimetres thick – more translucent than an eggshell – while individual strands of hair measure about 0.3 millimetres in diameter.

When images and videos of the sculpture appeared online, viewers repeatedly asked the same question: Was the clothing really porcelain rather than silk?

The work went on to attract crowds when displayed at the National Museum of China and the China Art Museum in Shanghai. The sculpture has since been displayed at major institutions and added to the collections of the National Museum of China and the China Art Museum in Shanghai, Youth Daily reported.

For Lian, the sculpture became more than a technical breakthrough. His attempt to bring his son back to school forced him to reconsider how traditional crafts should speak to a new generation.

"Times are changing," he said. "If we only ask young people to adapt to tradition and accommodate the past, classic crafts will eventually lose touch with the age."