许钦松

中国美术家协会副主席

广东省文学艺术界联合会主席

中国艺术研究院博士生导师

　　四年前，在广东省宣传人才基金项目的支持下，李节平先生以采风写生和田野调查的方式，深入农村进行实地考察。四年的光景中，他的足迹遍及全省大大小小的村落中，真正地扎根于农村，以实际行动践行了深入生活、扎根人民的文艺主张，他收集并创作了一批关于广东新时期农村风貌的素材与作品，并将于近日举办展览，为四年来的工作做一次系统梳理。作为他四年考察工作的见证人之一，李节平叮嘱我为展览写上几句，我自是欣然应允。

　　关于农村以及农民题材历来都是艺术家乐于表现的对象，无论是勃鲁盖尔以城市人眼光描绘农村那种滑稽的场景，或是米勒那些带有宗教与纪念碑意味的农民塑像，或者是对伤痕美术、乡土美术影响甚大的怀斯的乡土写实油画，都已是美术史上的经典。当然对于伴随着中华人民共和国成立以来成长起来的艺术家而言，大量反映社会主义新生活、新精神面貌的农民形象与图式则更是在心中留下了不可磨灭的记忆。

　　从此次“乡野考察”展览中所展现的作品来看，既包括了创作、写生、速写等多种艺术形式，又囊括了油画、中国画、版画、雕塑、装置等多媒介的艺术尝试，这些都为我们展现出一种更为立体的农村百态。当然，作为一位对农村与农民现状有诸多思考的艺术家，李节平似乎并不想仅仅为我们展现他在广东新农村行走的创作成果，大量的文字、现场照片，包括标注着写生点的广东省地图等资料赋予了这本画册一种纪实与文献的意义。更让人感到难能可贵的是作品间流露出的那份真实的气息，这份真实是艺术家“在场”的见证，同时也表明了艺术家作为观察者而非参与者的姿态。画家有意识地与表现对象或事件保持一定的距离，通过一种平视的视角精心叙事，这其中既无矫揉造作，也无刻意拔高或贬低，有的只是那份深藏于广大农村的平凡与真实。

　　当然，这种真实并不意味着没有立场，在画册若干作品的旁边，李节平会附上一段文字的介绍，比如说在《乡童》一作旁边李节平写道：“见过很多乡村小童，他们几乎都是留守儿童，相对于城市孩子，他们缺失了很多少儿期成长的快乐与关爱，他们没有夏令营，没有兴趣班。这是中国大环境下城乡教育差异的现状，尽管国家不断在改善，但这是一代两代人的事，任重道远。乡童们羞涩的眼神中充满迷茫的期待、好奇，甚至恐惧，着实让人怜惜。”在《雨水·远望》一作中李节平写道：“画中女主人是一名贫困乡镇村办小学的代课老师，她不是什么师范学校毕业的，学校缺老师，镇里又没有正式教师指标下来，就这样代课几年了。没课时在家务农，经常看到她放了学就匆匆赶回家，系上围腰拿着农具就下地了，是村里出了名的贤妻和能手。”诸如此类长短不一的文字或诉说着画中主人公的身份，或引申到对农村问题的思考，在细腻平实的文笔中娓娓道来，与作品共同交织成一个更为立体的农村图景，更表明了画家深切的人文关怀与现实主义态度。

　　对于现代画家来说，行万里甚至十万里路并不困难，对社会以及生活中的对象进行广泛的了解也不困难，困难的是对某一特定对象或者领域进行深入、持续、有效地挖掘，从而获得比他人更为深刻的感受与理解。从这个角度看，四年时间的农村考察，200多幅的创作与大量的文字、照片记录，李节平在“乡野考察”上的苦心经营无须赘言。我祝福李节平，祝愿他在农村农民题材上有更多深刻的、精彩的佳作诞生！

2018年9月17日

The Power of Ordinariness and Sincerity

Review on Li Jieping's Rural Investigation Project

　　Xu Qinsong

　　Vice chairman of the China Artists Association

　　Chairman of Guangdong Federation of Literature and Art Circles

　　Doctoral supervisor of Chinese National Academy of Arts

　　Four years ago, with the support of the Guangdong Provincial Propaganda Talent Fund, Mr. Li Jieping went to the countryside to conduct a rural investigation by the ways of painting, drawing and sketching from nature. In the past four years, he has traveled many villages throughout the province. He lived and experienced in the countryside, learned about the local people's life, collected and created a series of works about the rural areas in Guangdong with the background of the new period. Those works will be exhibited in recent days as a systematic review of the project in the past four years. As one of the witnesses of his four-year investigation, I was invited by Li Jieping to write a review of the works, and I definitely accepted it with pleasure.

　　The theme of the countryside and the peasants has always been the object of the artist's expression, and there are many masterworks in the history of art: Bruegel Pieter portrayed the hilarious scenes of the countryside in the eyes of the urbanite, Jean-Francois Millet endowed the statues of peasants a glamour of religion and monument; Andrew Wyeth created the rural-themed oil paintings in a realistic way which had a great influence on the Scar Art and Rural Art. Of course, for the artists who grew up with the People's Republic of China, the image and pattern of the peasants which reflect a lot of socialist new life and new spirit of socialism are even more indelible memories.

　　The Rural Investigation includes a variety of art forms and attempts such as sketch, drawing, oil painting, traditional Chinese painting, printmaking, sculpture, and installation, which demonstrate the three-dimensional rural areas. However, as an artist who has many thoughts on the actuality of rural areas and peasant, Li Jieping does not seem to want to show us only the works inspired by his investigation. A large amount of documents, including texts, on-site photos, the map of Guangdong Province which marked with investigation points, give this catalogue a documentary meaning. More commendably, the true feelings of the works see the artist's efforts as well as his attitude as an observer rather than a participant. He consciously maintained a certain distance from the object or event and elaborately narrated it with the sense of equality. Neither deliberately elevating nor degrading, he only focused on depicting the ordinariness and sincerity in the vast rural areas.

　　Certainly, this sincere depiction does not mean that the artist has no position. In addition to pictures of the works in the catalogue, Li Jieping wrote the introduction to the works. Take Rural Children as an example, Li Jieping wrote: "I have seen many rural children and most of them are left-behind children. Compared with urban children, they lack much of the joy and care of growing

　　up. They don't have summer camps and interest classes, and that is the current situation of China's urban-rural education differences. Although the country is constantly improving this situation, it takes time and has a long way to go. The shy eyes of the children are filled with confusion, expectation, curiosity, and even fear, which make me feel pity." In Rain Water: Overlooking , he wrote: "The hostess in this painting is a substitute teacher in a primary school in a poverty-stricken township. Because the school lacked a teacher, she taught there for several years though she did not graduate from a normal school. When she was out of class, she was farming at home, and I often saw her rushing home after she left school, tying up the waist, taking the farm tools and going to the fields. She is virtuous and proficient in the village." Some of these words tell the identity of the protagonist in the painting, and some reveal his reflection on rural issues. Those delicate and plain texts are intertwined with the works into a three-dimensional rural landscape, which further demonstrates the artist's deep humanistic care and realistic attitude.

　　For modern painters, it is easy to travel for painting or broadly understand the life and society. The difficulty is to conduct an in-depth, continuous and effective excavation to a specific object or field and to gain deeper feelings and understanding than others. From this perspective, the four-year rural investigation along with nearly 200 pieces of creation and a large number of texts and photos has witnessed Li Jieping's painstaking efforts in this project. I wish him more and more wonderful rural-themed works in the near future!

17th September, 2018