Using a ladder, Xiao Lu enters a 1.8 m high, 1.2 m square chamber built from 25 cm thick ice blocks. With a sharp knife she begins stabbing and chiselling the ice. During the performance her right palm is cut open over 7 cm. She presses the wound against the ice; the cold numbs the pain, allowing her to continue for 30 minutes until two holes are cut through. Dizzy, she stops. The curator and spectators pull her out. Xiao Lu was sent to Beijing Jishuitan Hospital and found her three muscles and one tendon have been severed.
My inspiration and my revelation for Polar were derived from the town Longyearbyen, near the North Pole, and enabled me to finish this work in Beijing. The bleeding not being planned, God arranged this unforeseen accident, and really allowed my life to connect with the aura of the polar region.
— Xiao Lu