我一直以我最浓厚的情感关注着大地万物，那田地、荒野中的一切听任上季的安排，周而复始，几经盛衰，而终归于土地，我感受到了那蕴含其中的强在力量，那生长，那沉寂，震撼着我，净化了我的心灵。我深为生命的美好所感动，一幅接一幅地绘画以寄托我的爱，表达我的思考与希望。大地，成了我最坚定的主题，她带我走向灵魂的家园，也载我驶向人生的的海洋。 　　1982年，我刚刚大学毕业，便被分配到了承德钢厂子弟学校任美术教师，当时我好像还没来得及设想和设计我的人生坐标，命运先做了安排。很长一段时间内我被这种“安排”几乎压垮了，钢厂建在远离城市的山区，我所住的三宿舍在一个光秃秃的土坡上，与一个贫穷的小村子混居，错落的小房子布满了坡上坡下，四周除了山丘还有杂草荆，生活条件苦不堪言，我曾深深地陷八孤独和空虚，可还是没有忘记画画，闲下来曾要画一些速写，画得多了一时忘记了不快，也有了兴趣和寄托，一有时间便见什么画什么，厂房，农舍，土坡，深沟都成了我描绘的对象，渐渐地我对它们有了感情，笔下的形象也生动了起来。后来又有画色彩的念头，就找出油画箱，如此却一发不可收拾，我运用浓艳的色彩，粗犷的线条，奔放的笔触，来描绘房子上的阳光，土坡上的绿树，忙碌的人们，装甲兵装甲兵地，面前的一切变得明亮而美丽了，我不厌其烦地表现每一束光线、每一条沟壑、每一道犁沟，因为正是这些才使得这一切变得如此可亲、动人，这一切也使我懂得了勃勃生机。而作画的道理也正如此，生活的幸福与美好，承决于你对生活的理解，取决你地生命是否热爱，拥有了美的心灵才会拥有美好的人生。 　　那一年我画了三十人造余幅油画，厚厚的两本速写，如今看来虽然觉得技巧方面有很多不足，但仍能感受到作画时投入的热情，画面上能够感人的也正是这些，也正因为此我珍视和保持这种经验，那是我第一次向社会，走向生活所经受的第一次考验，也是获得的第一次重大收获。 　　有第一次就会有第二次，我的第二次重大转变却是经历了十年后。面地生活、工作、家庭，我和亿万的女人甚至男人一样需要付出，同样也在生活中获得了更多的人生经验，懂得了更多的人生道理，但一如生活的坎坷，我的经画也经历了很多的磨难和很多的弯路，累次的参展（全国大展）落选，也曾使我改变绘画风格和追求，画过几幅连我睚己也不喜欢的画。还由于改革开放以后的西方现代绘画的大量涌入和国内艺术思潮的此起彼伏，也很大程度的影响了我，在经历子大量的模仿和盲目的“现代”之后，我又像当年初到承德山区那样，置身在陌生的境地，我愈来愈发现我的绘画已经走向了死路，那程式化的形象、过度夸张的色彩都因缺乏真情实感而显得毫无生气和做作，而社会上也正是涌起艺术新潮之后更大的潮流——经济潮。绘画、艺术，一时间好像又被人们所遗忘。这一切更使我陷八了孤独和空虚之中。然而，我的目光又遇到了田地。那是一个盛夏过后的日子，在市郊的晚霞之中，菜地的景色一下子吸引了我，那是农民正在给白菜浇水施肥，天空晴朗，挂着紫色霞辉，大地宁静深远，只有田中的水亮得像镜子，深绿色的植物和变黄的秧架排列在水中和周围，规矩的方田，呈现出了棋盘般的美妙和迷人的变化，这就是绘画！我又一次有了冲动，我又好像流浪的孩子找到家一样的激动，随后的几天我天天都出没在田野之中，画速写，拍照片，怀着创作的冲动暗下决心，一生都要坚持创作最贴近自己感受的绘画，要将大自然的美妙与我的灵魂结合起来，赋予艺术永恒丰富的精神内涵，那就是在1992年创作的《城苑系列》、《夏季风景系列》十余幅，其中城苑系列之一参加了同年的油画双年展并获得学院奖（二等奖）这些无颖是地我的创作是很有效的鼓励，更加强我继续钻研的信心。 　　夏季过后，是秋季，我看到农民在秋季的忙碌之中充满了喜悦，因为一年的收获季节毕竟是农民辛勤劳动和希望的回报，但我又看到田里的一另一番景象，收割之后的庄稼，连根拔起的白菜、萝卜，或堆放，或散落，一时间和渐冷的天气一起使我又产生了无限的悲衰情绪，我看到被剥了果实又割去了头穗的玉米殊茬在风中发抖，它们或倒或断地相互依靠，阳光洒在叶子上，金子般的光点像在做最后的抚慰。我注视着一切，脑海里想着很我多，胸中无法平静。忽然，我顿悟了。这就是真实！这就是美！大自然的一切蕴藏着无以言表的真理，她的美丽，她的奉献，她的再生正是一部宠大的生命交响乐。她献给了人类永恒的爱和宝藏，她有最深沉的哲理和最不可战胜的力量。秋后的景象也将是壮观的、辉煌的。在上后的一年多时间里我又以极大的热情，创作了八幅油画《秋季风景系列》，这些作品实现了我地大地的热爱和对生命的联想和思考，也正由此我开始更多地参加国内各种大型展览和学术活动，〈秋季风景系列〉还获过金奖，我获得了更多的荣誉和鼓励，在专业圈内也博得了画家、批评家的关心。这使我更明白了一个道理，艺术作品的生命是热情，而艺术家的热情是来自于自然，生活，那就是最富于感染力的，最健康向上的。 　　目前，我正创作〈乐土系列〉，在描绘大地的母题不变的情况下理性的深层推进，将的情感和理解，凝聚成更深沉的力量，使我的感悟得到升华。〈乐土系列〉比〈秋季风景系列〉基调更为沉稳，视野更宽阔，加强了对沟壑、道路和烧荒剩下的余灰与秸秆的特写，笔法坚实，厚重，炭黑色与黄土色控制了整个画面，使作品显得庞大而低沉。我每完成一幅作品就如同又一次与大地做了一次深淡，像朋友，越是交心就越是少了客套和修饰，甚至语言也会变得少起来的。 　　1997年 　　IDEAS ON ART 　　With the most profound feelings, I have observed all the living things on earth s well as the earth itself. They follow the cycle of seasons and go through the vicissitudes of existence before ultimately returning to the vast land. I can feel an overwhelming power in the process; the visceral quietude of growth has purified my soul. Deeply touched by this beauty of life, I’ve produced one painting after another to represent my love, hope, and contemplation. The earth has become the most consistent them in my artistic career, guiding me across the billowing wvaes of the ocean of life toward my spiritual home. 　　Upon my college graduation in 1982, I was assigned to work as a fine art teacher at the Chengde Steel Works Primary School. There was hardly any time for me to make a plan for my future as destiny crammed my life with its arbitrary arrangmemets, which nearly crushed me over the months to follow. The Steel Works was located in the mountains, a long way from the urban area. The dormitories where I live formed part of a poor village on the hillside. Enclosing the rows of bungalow housing were formidable mountains covered with rampant weeds. Life was hard beyond description. In spite of my occasional fits of idle loneliness, I never forget painting. Whenever I was free, I would draw some sketches, and the act of drawing dispelled my sorrow and soon became a form of entertainment for me. As I kept drawing whatever came into my sight, the factory facilities, farmhouses, mountain slopes, and valleys began to come alive on the paper; I found myself falling in love with them. Soon I felt a need for colors and took out the easel and brushes; oil painting soon became part of my life. With bold colors, rugged lines, and unrestrained brushstrokes, I filled the canvas with images of the sunlit building, foliage on the slope, and busy comings and goings. Gradually, the world began to look bright and beautiful. My persistent depiction of the light, and the furrows in the fields has led me to see the inherent loveliness of the world around me. It dawned on me that these unadorned things, which derive their force of life straight from heaven and earth, or nature, are closest to the essence of beauty. It is the same with life; whether you are happy or not is determined by your understanding of life. Only a passionate love of life and a heart filled with beauty can lead us to see the best things around us. Over the year, I painted more than thirty oils and filled two big sketchbooks. By my standards today, those works are quite weak in terms of techniques, but it is fascinating that I can still experience the enthusiasm and passion that I invested in them, which is the very quality that makes a painting genuinely touching. That is why I value that experience and try to relive it again and again. It was the first challenge I’d encountered both as a social being and an artist, and that experience has turned out to be the first significant reward in my career. 　　The first was followed by the second, which didn’t come until ten years later. During the decade, as a an artist, teacher, wife, and mother, I’d been doing what was expected of me like the tens of millions of other women and men, which in return enriched my experience of life and led me to understand the way of the world. The difficulty in life was echoed by a string of hardships in my artistic career. Failing to enter nationwide exhibitions time and again, I had tried to adjust my style and produced several paintings against my standards of aesthetics. The influx of Western and the dynamics of domestic art circles at that time also exerted a considerable influence on me. After a period of indiscriminate imitation and copying of “modernism”, I found myself caught in a strand situation, like the banishment to the mountains ten years before. Gradually I was forced to admit that my paintings were not going anywhere; without any genuine fellings, the stereotyped imagery and over-exaggerated palette appeared gloomy and affected. And the art movements themselves proved short-lived as economic development was becoming the order of the day across China. As the world seemed to have forgotten painting and fine arts in general, I was plunged into miserable loneliness However, all of this suddenly changed as I set eyes on the open country. It was the evening of a summer day when the view of suburban vegetable instantly caught my attention. There farmers were watering and manuring cabbages. In the background, the serene land stretched as far as the eye could see under the rosy clouds in the clear skies; the water in the fields was shining like a mirror, surrounded dark green vegetables and yellowing stalks. The uniform patches of farmland presented a spectacle of mesmerizing changing and shifting. What a beautiful painting! I got my inspirations, excited as a lost child returning to home after a hard journey. I spent the following days in the open country, drawing sketches and taking photos. Seized by the impulse for artistic creation, I made up my mind to devote the rest of my life to painting those images that truly affect me. I was determined to merge my soul into the wonderful nature and thereby endow my art with a rich spirituality that is eternal. The result was the paintings of the “Urban Garden” and “Summer Scenery” series in 1992. As a painting from my “Urban Garden” series entered the Annual Exhibition of Chinese Oil Painting and “the Fascinating Plain”, a collaboration with my husband Qi Mengguang , was honored with the Award at the Oil Painting Biennale the following year, I became even more determined to continue my pursuit. 　　After Summer comes autumn. In their busiest season of the year, farmers were beaming joy and satisfaction. After all, they were finally reaping the harvest after a year of hard work and earnest expectation. But what moved.

作者：徐晓燕