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HONGBO： THE SPACE OF LANDSCAPE， THE PLACE OF LANDSCAPE

2022-11-18 10:33:17 未知

　　What is a landscape？ Is it a topography， a terrain， a natural (or man-made) arrangement of things constituting a view outdoors？ Is it a phenomenon of nature made into a picture， or is it a phenomenon of art based on observation？ Is a landscape a thing or a picture， a specific formation of objects or an abstraction， a sensation or atmosphere？ Is it a specific history or is it an eternal truth？ All artists who address themselves to the depiction of landscape must struggle with these questions， can only answer by painting rather than just thinking， and can only serve to pose more questions： what is universal about the landscape？ What is specific to landscapes located in different parts of the world？ How does a localized tradition of landscape painting present - even serve and honor - the land from which it arises？ Can someone apply the skills of a seascape painter， for instance， to the painting of mountains？ Can someone go halfway around the globe and look at a very foreign landscape appropriately？ Will the artist from far away not see what local people see？ Will that artist see what the locals don‘t see？ Will the tradition be compromised？ Will the landscape itself？

　　We think the most challenging subject in art is the human figure (and/or face). It may be so for the audience， but for artists themselves the landscape poses the toughest questions， as the paragraph above indicates. The drama of the figure is easily accessed and exploited. Still life subjects can be endlessly fascinating， but they can’t be infinitely variable. Even interiors rely on the constancy of their intimate circumstance. But you can‘t command the landscape in the same way. You must meet it halfway. You must compromise your ambitions in order to capture the landscape’s essence - the spirit of the landscape as opposed just to its appearance.

　　Hongbo used to be a landscape painter. Now he is a landscape artist whose primary tool happens to be the brush. In fact， the brush is not merely Hongbo‘s tool， it is his spirit guide， the thing that leads him into and through the space of landscape. Whether he is painting hills or houses， flowers or clouds， Hongbo renders these phenomena as concoctions of paint - drawn concoctions， evincing the source of his style in Asian ink painting. His subjects， too， are grounded in Chinese subjects： buildings nestled on the slopes of mountains， clouds adrift， floral bursts that are very un-still still lifes. Nature’s wild side always seems to be roiling to the surface of Chinese landscape painting， and in Hongbo‘s approach nature bursts through in a torrent of painterly energy.

　　Of course， Hongbo’s debt is not only to Chinese art but to Western art as well. A thoroughly 21st-century painter， he Is the product of Eastern and Western art equally. If he inheres the two thousand years of his forerunners‘ painting， he also embraces several centuries of European and American realism， tonalism， impressionism， expressionism， and abstraction. Traditional Eastern and modern Western landscape painting share a devotion to the emotional force of painted space， a recognition that the effect natural space has on us is the result of extra-visual response. We don’t just see landscape， we feel it， we breathe it， and Hongbo is the latest painter to remind us of that.

　　Hongbo distinguishes himself not simply through the vitality and persuasiveness of his painting， but through his willingness to experiment， innovate， push the envelope whether in a particular painting or in a whole new method for “building” painted space. His recent work introduces pronounced texture into the painted surfaces， almost as if he is physically constructing the mountains and the valleys， the trees and the leaves， the rivers and the clouds. None of these factors are realistically depicted， and in fact they all seem to dissolve into wrinkled ridges flecked with brushstrokes evoking (but not depicting) branches and soil and hilltops. This is landscape not simply abstracted but boiled down to its organic and inorganic material - a diet of wind and grit flecked with brilliant fruit.

装置/又见青绿局部

　　Even more radical are the painted installations Hongbo has recently been composing， great seas or forests of paper， draped over vertical supports (usually stacks of Styrofoam) and then painted in a frenzy of virtuosic slashing and dripping. This makes it sound as if he were emulating Jackson Pollock， but the result is far from Pollock‘s tight skeins of pigment trails. Rather， Hongbo draws as much as paints with the brush， lying in a mark at a certain fold in the paper so as to balance another mark nearby and thus compiling extensive networks of sometimes clotting， sometimes rambling pathways of color - ways for our eyes to enter the physical space of the installation and the conjured space of the painting.

　　Does our encounter with these complex reinterpretations of the landscape answer our questions about landscape itself？ They may well， but the questions Hongbo wants to answer and be done with are the old ones， about technique and imitation and the differences between East and West. Indeed， he wants to push those questions out of our way entirely so that a different set of questions - a different way of questioning - can emerge， a set of questions that make us more responsive to a shrinking world， a restless humanity， and a more and more quickly changing climate. The relationship of humanity to nature is the ultimate question here， spinning at the core of Hongbo’s earth. That is why he took America‘s national parks as a focused subject： to him， the commitment the parks represent to the land and its biome， first declared over a hundred years ago， represents a large-scale vision， as much art as politics or science， devoted to sharing the planet rather than exhausting it. He also recognized the parks’ physical parallels with Chinese land， similarly spectacular and celebrated for centuries by artists.

　　Is Hongbo a landscape painter， then？ Only if you accept the idea of a “landscape” as something more than a place， something more than space. Just as East and West mirror each other in Hongbo‘s art， the human race finds itself reflected in the natural world. When asked if he painted from nature， Jackson Pollock responded， “I AM nature.” In other words， he didn’t have to make paintings of nature to be natural， he only had to make paintings. Hongbo thinks much the same way but also values the pictorial qualities of nature just as his ancestors did. WE are nature， he insists and demonstrates with every stroke.

Los AngelesAugust 2022

装置/又见青绿系列

洪波的山水世界

弗兰克·彼得 | 国际艺术评论家策展人诗人

　　何谓山水？它是地形、地貌构成户外美轮美奂的自然(或人造)现象，还是一种基于美感观察的艺术现象？山水是事物还是图像，是具象物体还是抽象概念，是感觉还是氛围？它是否具有特定的历史价值亦或永恒的人文真理？凡是创作山水画的艺术家都面临诸如此类的问题，他们都只能用移情于景的作品来回答这些问题，并引申出更多的思考：什么是山水的普遍性？世界不同地区的山水有什么特别的在地性？山水画的本土化传统如何呈现，又如何忠于它的发源地？有没有人可以将描绘海水的技能运用到描绘山峦上？有没有人能游走大半个地球，精准去描绘陌生的异域风情？远道而来的艺术家能看到当地人之所见吗，还是会以不同的视角看到当地人之所不见？传统会不会被破坏？那山水画呢？

　　人们普遍认为艺术创作中最具挑战性的题材是人物画。对普罗大众来说或许如此，但对艺术家来说，山水才是最棘手的题材。人物题材里的肖像和情绪很容易被理解，结构比例也可以被透析。静物题材可以无穷无尽地引人入胜，但它们不可能是无限变化的。即使是室内设计也依赖于其固有环境的恒定性。但是你不能以同样的方式支配山水，从养浩然之气的维度上考量，要画好山水画更难。你必须放下你的野心，性与境会，才能捕获到山水的灵性，而不仅仅是它的表象。

　　洪波先生用手中的毛笔作为精神向导、引领他从山水画家蜕变成为山水创作抽象艺术家。毛笔不单是洪波的作画工具，更是他的精神向导，引领他跨进并穿梭于他的山水世界里。无论是画山峦还是建筑、花卉亦或云彩，洪波都将这些物象幻化为和谐的景致，这是他水墨艺术风格来源。他的创作也以中国题材为基础：山坡上的建筑、飘浮的云彩、绽放的花朵，这些都是非静止的静物。大自然狂野的一面似乎总是在中国山水画的画面上翻腾，在洪波的笔下，大自然迸发着一股绘画能量的洪流。

　　当然，洪波艺术不仅来自中国艺术，也来自西方艺术。一个彻头彻尾的21 世纪艺术家，他同样是东西方艺术的产物。他既传承了两千多年的传统山水画，也融入了几个世纪以来的欧美现实主义、色调主义、印象主义、表现主义和抽象主义。东方传统山水画和现代西方山水画都热衷于绘画空间的情感力量，认识到自然空间对我们的影响是超视觉反应的结果。我们不只是看山水，我们也感受它，呼吸它，洪波提醒我们关注这一点。

　　洪波的与众不同不仅在于他绘画的活力和影响力，还在于他无论是在特定的绘画中还是在“构建”绘画空间的全新方法中，都愿意进行实验、创新和挑战极限。他最近的作品在绘画表面使用了明显的肌理、构建山脉和山谷、树木和枝叶、河流和云彩。这些因素都没有被真实地描绘出来，事实上，它们似乎都溶解在褶皱的山脊中，上面布满了并非描绘出来的笔触，点染出树枝、土壤和山顶。这景致不是简单抽象的，而是由各种有机和无机材质融合而成的，一餐自然风物佳肴。

装置/又见青绿肌理

　　更激进的是洪波最新创作的装置作品，大幅的中国宣纸，覆盖于堆叠的泡沫上，辅以精湛的材料切割，最终以泼墨泼彩造就。听起来像在模仿杰克逊·波洛克，但结果却与波洛克的紧密颜料痕迹相去甚远。更确切地说，他用毛笔在纸上的某个折痕处画上一个标记，与旁边的另一个标记平衡，从而编织出时而凝固，时而散乱的颜色通道网络，这是我们的眼睛进入装置艺术的物理空间和绘画的魔幻空间的途径。

　　以上这些对山水各个层面的诠释分析是否回答了关于山水本身的问题？或许可以，但洪波想要回答和解决的问题是，关于东西方的技法差异。事实上，他想把这些问题重新组合排列，以一种全然不同的提问方式，全球化的世界、日益焦虑不安的人类和恶劣气候的急速变化，洪波先生的宇宙观里感受人与自然的关系才是终极问题，也是其思想内核。这就是他把美国国家公园作为一个重点主题的成因：在他看来，以保护自然原始美景为主导的美国国家公园体系一百多年前首次宣布，代表着对这片土地及其生物群落的承诺，这是一个大范围的愿景，既是艺术，也是政治和科学。人类应致力于共享这个星球，而不是耗尽它。他还意识到这些公园与中国的土地诉说着同样的景观语言，他们如此相似，同样壮观，让几个世纪艺术家们为之疯狂。

　　那么，洪波是一位山水画家吗？当你接受“景观”不仅仅是一个地域、一个空间的概念，在洪波的艺术作品中，东西方文化互为映照，人类在自然世界中找到自身的投射。被问及是否参照自然来作画时，他引用了杰克逊·波洛克回答：“我就是自然。” 换句话说，他不必为了画自然而画自然，他只需要作画。如同他的先辈一样，洪波更重视绘画的品质。我们就是大自然，他一直在践行。

洛杉矶

2022.8

　　弗兰克·彼得 / Peter Frank

　　国际艺术评论家策展人诗人

　　弗兰克·彼得为《赫芬顿邮报》、《美国艺术》、《艺术新闻》、《白热》、《Angeleno 杂志》等众多出版物撰写文章，他是《Visions Art Quarterly 》的编辑，也是《洛杉矶周刊》、纽约《The Village Voice 》和《The SoHo Weekly News 》的艺术评论家。

　　弗兰克·彼得曾担任古根汉姆博物馆、滨江美术馆的高级策展人，曾为文献展、威尼斯双年展、索非亚王后国家艺术中心博物馆以及许多其他国家和国际场所担任策展人。

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洪波绘画/近作山水

2021-2022