From the beginning I was trying to make something as direct as possible with clay: the earth.

I wanted to work with people and to make a work about our collective future and our responsibility for it. I wanted the art to look back at us, its makers (and later viewers), as if we were responsible - responsible for the world that it [

] and we were in. I have made it - with help - five times in different parts of the world.

The most recent is from Guangzhou, China, and was exhibited in Guangzhou, Beijing, Shanghai and Chongqing in 2003. It is made from 125 tonnes of clay energised by fire, sensitised by touch and made conscious by being given eyes.

The 210,000 body-surrogates completely occupy the space in which they are installed, taking the form of the building and excluding us, but allowing visual access.

It is always seen from a single threshold. The dimensions of the viewing area are equivalent to no less than one sixth of the total floor area of the piece. This viewing area is completely empty.

The viewer then mediates between the occupied and unoccupied areas of a given building. I like the idea of the physical area occupied being put at the service of the imaginative space of the witness.

Work in progress with the Texca family, brickmakers in the parish of St Matias, Cholula, Mexico, December 1990

Terracotta, around 35,000 elements, each 8-26cm, overall dimensions variable. Salvatore Ala Gallery, New York, 1991

Terracotta, around 35,000 elements, each 8-26 cm, overall dimensions variable. Salvatore Ala Gallery, New York, 1991

Terracotta, around 35,000 elements, each 8-26cm, overall dimensions variable. Salvatore Ala gallery, New York, 1991

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