近两年来，我一直在关注“他们”这一对年轻画家的工作进展，我在他们的艺术方式和不断展开的画面中看到了许多新的东西。在当代艺术越来越趋于综合形态，许多画家放弃绘画这种传统语言而转向新媒体实验时，“他们”却快乐而专注地沉迷在绘画上，相信用绘画的语言足以表达他们的思考和感受，十分真挚地把绘画当作倾诉心理活动的媒介。在当代绘画不断遭受其他媒体艺术的侵犯而失去自我表现力的时候，“他们”的绘画采用了一种新的叙事方式，使画面的视觉性与艺术的观念形成直接的默契。实际上，我在联系中国当代艺术整体状况观察“他们”时，我看到了他们正在以绘画新一代的姿态迅速成长并悄然成熟起来，“他们”的艺术展现的是中国当代艺术一些新的征候。

　　在目前中国经济高速发展的背景之下，城市及商业文明日益剧变，人们的视觉经验和内心体验发生了极大的转变。许多让人目眩神迷的社会现象以及混乱复杂的表象世界都巨大的冲击着人们的生理及心理。“他们”的作品正是在这样一种背景底下，利用室内和室外这两种相互独立而又相互关联的空间来表现外部世界的变化和人们内心世界的体验。

　　外部世界与内心世界之间的碰撞、交织与矛盾是他们艺术中最为本质和独特的地方。虽然这种境遇是古往今来艺术家的基本境遇，但在“他们”这一代人身上，反映得更加直接和强烈，他们的反应也更加直接和强烈。也许，欲望和焦虑的“具体化”是“他们”艺术必然的选择，通过一个“具体”而极其普通的有限空间，他们将现实的、生活的以及内心的现象直接地表现了出来，并把已经有的和可能有的存在并置在同一空间里，甚至在情节和形象上推向无限。他们所绘制的景色、物体、人物等东西带有司空见惯的经验，却在这个空间中变得令人惊异和独特，像电影语言般的叙事和片断的展开令人感觉亦真亦幻，在真中感觉到幻，在幻中感觉到真。

　　在“他们”的作品中窗外总是出现一些今日中国城市的新兴景观，同时也包括了很多诗意化的风景，勾画出中国新时代的气象，让人感觉到一种时间的流逝。无论是自然的还是人工的景观，都是外部世界在人内心世界的投射，而室内的故事则是两位作者内心深处真实的表达。他们对现实总是保留了那么一点点苦涩和距离，冷冰冰的房子和孤寂的场景，永远不变的空间和不断变化的情节，体现了一种深刻的中国传统精神与变与不变的哲学思辨，这与中国画千年不变的山水精神构成线索。

　　在这个时代中，我们恰恰需要一种内心的平静，一缕午后的阳光，浮躁和诱惑是当代生活中的表象，而生于70年代末80年代初的青年们不得不面对社会状况，“他们”的作品正体现了这难得的宁静与创造性。他们的合作和从前的集体主义有根本上的区别，他们不是在集体无意识的状态下加入集体并服从集体，而是出于一种自觉，他们乐于并渴望通过一种合作与团队精神来达到更强的力量，更深的意义，以及更无限的世界。

　　“他们”的每个空间中永远存在的那个柜子里面总是放着一部电视机与象征物，它们似乎开启了一个联系外部世界和内部世界的一个特殊频道，它们似乎提示着人们又似乎迷惑着人们。始终背对着观众的皮衣男子，似乎就是艺术家心目中的那个自我，也像是一个冷眼观看这幅作品的观众。“他”的出镜率非常之高，但是他的身份却非常神秘，我相信“他们”的作品能够通过某种方式的并置，产生象电影剪辑般的效果，这种有趣而新颖的叙事方式，创造了一种新的观念绘画形式，使绘画通向了一条可以更多义性的呈现。

　　青年艺术家是最敏感的，他们的作品也是最令人意想不到的，不论时代怎样发展，物质世界怎样改变，世界如何更加波普和现实化，青年人中一定不会全都是浅薄的，他们中一定能有体味到人生和世界的深刻的某一群。他们在世界的某个地方，他们就是我们时代的未来与希望所在。艺术不仅仅是反映现实，艺术还是超于现实的。而艺术的创造性更应体现在作品于美术史中的线索和独立性，正如“他们”所言，“我们取名为‘他们’就是希望更多的抛却自我而去深入人们的内心，并说出他们的内心语言和梦幻”。

　　Postmeridian Sunlight:

　　The Present and the Possible

　　Fan Di'an Director of the National Art Museum of China

　　For the recent two years, I've been paying attention to the progress of "TA MEN", a couple of young painters. I've seen many new things in their art mode and unfolding pictures. As the form of contemporary art tends to be integrated and many painters have given up the traditional language of painting and turned to new media experiment, "TA MEN" still indulge themselves in painting, happily and attentively. Believing that the language of painting is adequate to express their thoughts and feelings, They exploit painting true-heartedly as a media for their outpourings of psychological activities. When the contemporary painting keeps being encroached by other media arts and lost its self-expressiveness, "TA MEN" adopt a new narrative mode in their paintings, which renders direct harmony between the visuality of picture and the concept of art. Actually, when I am observing "TA MEN" against the backdrop of the overall situation of contemporary Chinese art, I noticed their rapid grow-up and quite maturity as a new generation of painter. The art of "TA MEN" shows several new symptoms of contemporary Chinese art.

　　Under the circumstances of the rapid development of Chinese economy, city and commercial civilization are undergoing daily revolution, and tremendous transition is also witnessed in people's vision taste and inner experience. People's physiology and psychology is under the immense impact of many dazzling social phenomena and confusing and complicated idea world. Just under such a circumstance, the works of "TA MEN" make use of two independent and at the same time interdependent spaces, namely, indoor and outdoor, to manifest changes of the outer world and experiences of people's inner world.

　　Collision, entanglement and contradiction between the outer world and the inner world is the essence and feature of their art. Although this situation has been experienced by artists of all ages, as to people of the generation of "TA MEN", its reflection is more direct and intensive, so is their response. Possibly the "embodiment" of desire and worry is an inevitable choice of the "TA MEN" art. Through a "concrete" yet quite ordinary finite space, They portray directly realistic, life as well as inner phenomena, and juxtapose present existence and possible existence in the same space, even push them up to infinity in plot and image. Although landscape, objects and characters They have depicted are all common experience, they become amazing and unique in this space. Narration like film language and spreading of fragments make people feel that they may be true or may be imaginary. It's hard to tell between the two feelings.

　　In works of "TA MEN", out of the door, there always appear some emerging sights in today's Chinese cities and at the same time many poetic scenes. These delineate the atmosphere of the new epoch in China and remind people of a lapse of time. Both natural and man-made sights are the reflection of the outer world on people's inner world, while indoor stories are the true expression of the most inner world of the two authors. They always reserve a little bitterness and keep distance away from the reality. Cold house, lonely scenes, invariable space and everchanging plot all incorporate a profound traditional Chinese spirit and the philosophy of "change and not to change", which is in inherent relationship with the ever-lasting mountains-and-rivers spirit of traditional Chinese painting.

　　It is just in this era that we need a kind of inner placidity, in other words, a ray of postmeridian sunlight. Impetuousness and temptation are presentations of the present life, while young people born in late 1970s and early 1980s have to face the situation. The works of "TA MEN" just materialize these remarkable placidity and creativity. Their cooperation is basically distinguished from the former collectivism. They are not joining in and submitting to the group in a state of collective unconsciousness. On the contrary, they consciously long to derive stronger force，to achieve greater significance and to reach the infinite world by means of cooperation and team spirit and take pleasure in it.

　　There are invariably a TV set and indication in the ever-present cabinet in every space of "TA MEN". They seem to offer a special channel connecting the outer world and the inner world. It seems that they're not only giving people some hints but also puzzling them. The man in fur coat with his back against the viewer seems to be the ego in the artist's heart. He also seems to be a viewer who takes a cool look at this production. "He" appears very often, but he has a very mysterious identity. I believe an effect of movie editing can be achieved with the juxtaposition of the works of "TA MEN" in a certain way. This interesting yet original narrative mode creates a new form of concept painting and links painting to presentation of multiple meanings.

　　Young artists are the most sensitive. Their works are also the most unpredictable. No matter how the society develops, how the physical world changes, how the world becomes more popular and actualistic, it is certain that not all of them are shallow and some of them will necessarily be profound enough to taste the life and the world. They are somewhere in this world. They are the future and hope of our time. Art not only reflects but also go beyond reality. Whereas the creativity of art should be materialized more in the position and independence of art works in the art history. Just as "TA MEN" have put it, "we name ourselves as 'TA MEN' just in the hope of throwing off ego and go deep into people's inner world and gave mouth to their inner words and dreams".

Fan Di'an

April, 2006 In Beijing

作者：范迪安