As a member of the first ‘one-child generation’, Ma expressed an artistic ‘sensitivity’ from a young age, evident in Self-portrait Series (1990–2000). Perhaps it is due to growing up in a one-child era, but everyone seems to be an only child, from playmates and classmates to adulthood friends. Combined with excessive doting, people of this generation seem to have adopted a more ‘perceptive’ radar. Ma’s works nearly always convey a subtle scepticism: multimedia, but imbued with a certain ‘soulfulness’. Regardless of whether the work is video, photography, installation, performance, event, painting, sculpture or any other media, there is always a ‘self-constructed mirror’ – the hidden mirror in self-portraits, the lens in various videos or even a window within a painting.