Aussi Chen出生于台北市，现居住工作于洛杉矶，毕业于艺术中心设计学院。在他的系列作品《Past Digitized Spirits》中，Aussi Chen通过使用了油漆、亚克力与树脂材料，探索了虚拟世界与视频、游戏空间如何与现实个体产生联系。在创作初期，他采访了曾使用过虚拟空间形象的人们，并以他们的形象为蓝本创作了一系列物理空间。在他的作品中，看似是抽象表现主义或超现实主义的笔触，其实代表了虚拟精神体的具象含义。画面中的树脂材料呈现出镜子和屏幕般的质感，使得观者仿佛迷失在现实和虚拟的交界处。在充满自由想象的虚拟世界中，人们可以成为任何他们想成为的样子——任何人、动物、生命形态，跨越了现实规则的拘束。如此，Aussi Chen给了虚拟的世界图像及形象以物质载体，使得虚拟的具象存在于现实中。

Aussi Chen was born in Taipei, now lives and works in Los Angeles, and graduated from Art Center College of Design. In his series "Past Digitized Spirits", Aussi Chen uses paint, acrylic paint and resin to explore how virtual worlds and video and game spaces relate to real individuals. In the early stages of creation, he interviewed people who had used images of virtual spaces and created a series of physical spaces based on their images. The seemingly abstract expressionist or surrealist brushstrokes in his works represent the concrete meaning of the virtual spiritual body. The resin material in the picture presents a mirror and screen-like texture, making the viewer seem lost at the junction of reality and virtuality. In the virtual world full of free imagination, people can become whatever they want - any person, animal, life form, beyond the constraints of the rules of reality. In this way, Aussi Chen gave the images and images of the virtual world a material carrier, making the virtual images exist in reality.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：黎扬扬 Annie Li Yangyang

A：Aussi Chen

Q：是什么样的灵感启发你去创作这一系列作品的？

A：应该是起源于我开始思考之前的创作《AnAn》《AnAn的鸟瞰》《巨型淘气兔》和《哆啦A梦》的时候开始。对我来说，赛博空间或虚拟领域作为现实空间和虚拟空间中的个体认知产生了不小的影响。其中，无论是《巨型淘气兔》中的SealOnline 2里的淘气兔，还是《AnAn》、《AnAn的鸟瞰》中的Nokia n95的像素化蛇，我都采纳了各式各样的在线身份。这些在线身份，是以实体躯壳的形式，比如一团乌黑的油漆，一道蓝色的色铅笔迹，带着创作者（或者参与者）的精神体存在于画布上。

我们的研究生项目有来自行业的知名客座访客和艺术家。每周，我们都可以根据他们的时间约见其中的几位。有一次，Larry Johnson来到我的工作室，看到了我正在做的采访项目。那时，我已经采访了不少人的过去的数字化身份，但我只是根据他们告诉我的信息在画布上进行了抽象解读，并请他们在我的抽象解释上进行“纠正”。最终的结果看起来就像其他的抽象画，Larry质疑了我对艺术品的品味和喜好，并询问我什么是好画和坏画。然后一切就从那里开始了。

Q：What kind of inspiration inspired you to create this series?

A：It started off with the work called AnAn, AnAn’s Bird’s Eyes View, Giant Rascal Rabbit, Doraemon, etc., where I thought about the significance of a work of art for an artist. And for me, cyberspace, or the virtual realm, has had an impact on how I perceive myself as an individual in both the IRL space and the virtual space. I’ve adopted various identities online, whether it be a rascal rabbit from SealOnline 2 in my work Giant Rascal Rabbit, or the pixelated snake from Nokia n95 in my work AnAn, AnAn’s Bird’s Eyes View. They have become a record of a past digitized identity as a form of body on the canvas.

Our graduate program has guest visitors and artists who are very well-known in the industry. And every week, we can meet a few of them, depending on their schedules. One time, Larry Johnson came to my studio and saw what I was doing with the interview project. At the time, I had already started interviewing other people about their digitized identities from the past, but I only took what they told me, interpreted it in an abstract form, and asked them to “correct” on top of my abstract interpretations. The final results looked just like other abstract paintings, and Larry questioned my tastes in a work of art and asked what a good painting and a bad painting were for me. Then everything just went off from there.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：在采访人们关于虚拟形象的过程中让你收获了怎样的感受和思考？

A：我喜欢与不同的人建立一些连接，思考他们会如何对一个已制定的规则作出不同的答应。其实在某种意义上，他们作为参与者的身份在我的作品中已成为了一个非常重要的作者，和朋友。人与人之间的缘分是很奇妙的，他们并不是一件作品的一次性参与者，而是会在未来的几年、十几年间，以社群成员、朋友的身份在人生不同的轨迹里，思考着当下在虚拟空间中的最重要、最有联结、最感动的自己。和我一起在不同的时期，以不同的心境记录这一切，并且将这一部分的分身，代入虚实的生命。

Q：What reflections and thoughts did you have throughout the process of interviewing people about their virtual image?

A：I enjoy forming connections with different people, pondering how they would respond differently to a set rule. In a way, their role as participants has already become a crucial author and friend in my work. The bond between people is fascinating. They are not just one-time participants in a piece of work. Instead, they will, in the coming years or even decades, as community members and friends, reflect upon the most significant, most connected, and most touching moments they experienced in the virtual space. Together with me, at different times and in different moods, they will record all of these and integrate this part of themselves into both virtual and real life.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：作品中出现的记号有无符号意义？

A：有的，每一个符号都代表着一个字。然后每一个字都是源自于采访者的叙述。

Q：Do the marks in your works represent any symbolic meaning?

A：Yes, each of the symbols is drawn by the interviewees that represent a word from their descriptions of their past spirits from the grand virtual database.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：你希望通过这个系列中出现的文字、表情、符号传达什么样的思考？

A：这些符号代表词汇，而词汇代表语言。这些符号采用儿童式的语言绘制，并与其相应的抽象画作并列。这指向艺术与孩子之间的关系。最重要的是，这些符号是从类似ASCII代码的领域生成的另一种语言形式，它们并不一定是为了被理解而设计的。

Q：What thoughts are you trying to convey through the words and emojis in the series?

A：The symbols represent words, and the words represent language. The symbols are drawn with a child remedial-like language juxtaposed with their corresponding abstract paintings. It has something to do with the relationship between high art and something your kid can do. Most importantly, the symbols are another form of language generated from a realm like ASCII codes that aren’t necessarily intended to be understood.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：人类精神和虚拟世界形象的链接对你而言有什么意义？

A：在我小时候，我总是幻想自己在线上变成其他形式的生命，无论是一棵树、一个兽人、一个精灵、一个虚拟形象，或任何人类/生物形态的东西。而在在线环境中，我们所做的每一件事都会在大型在线数据库的服务器上留下足迹。本质上，我们过去的某一部分精神已经在某个在线地方被归档了。对我来说，这很令人兴奋，因为它们已经存在于那里，作为一种数据的形式，影响着其他人并创造影响，无论大小。

Q：What does the link between human’s spirits and their virtual images mean to you?

A：Growing up as a kid, I always fantasized about myself as other forms of life beings online, whether it be a tree, an orc, an elf, an avatar, or anything human or biomorphic. And whatever we do in the online setting, we leave footprints on the grand server of the online database. Essentially, a part of our past spirits has been archived somewhere online, and I think that is exciting for me because they have been out there, existing as a form of data, influencing others, and creating impacts, whether they are small or large.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：你如何畅想未来的物理与虚拟世界的联系以及与全球化的关系？

A：电子游戏已经对我们日常生活中的身份认知产生了影响。艺术家和理论家Hito Steyerl认为，游戏的机制在现实生活中的扩展如此之广，以至于日常生活在很大程度上都被“游戏化”了。Steyerl将那些监控系统，比如消费者监控或任何使用者偏好的数字目录，看作是以类似游戏的方式被注册的。我对绘画作为一个工具来捕捉（模仿）在线图像，以及作为一个承载全球精神流的物理形式很感兴趣。几百年来，画家们都是根据他们对直接肉眼可见的物理环境来评估和确定他们所想画的题材：记录他们用眼睛所看到的，从自己的意识中表达他们的思想。但是，随着数字时代的到来，AI和其他先进的技术程序和游戏已经改变了艺术氛围。我们在现实生活中遇到的大部分内容都无法逃离技术的全球网络，无论是以电磁波、Wi-Fi信号、通过GPS的行为记录、信用卡、在互联网上浏览、在不同的游戏世界中玩耍，还是在Adobe套件中编辑。所有这些参与的形式都被记录存档在一个围绕着我们头顶旋转的虚拟大气层中。

Q：How do you imagine the connection between the physical and the virtual world in the future, as well as its relationship with globalization?

A：Video games have had an impact on our daily lives in regard to how we perceive our identities. The artist and theorist, Hito Steyerl, thinks the mechanisms of games are so expanded in real life, that everyday life is, to a large extent, getting gamified.  Steyerl sees systems of extended surveillance, such as consumer monitoring, or the digital cataloging of any preferences, as being registered in a way which resembles a game. I’m fascinated with the idea of painting as a vessel for capturing (mimicking) online images on its surface, and as a physical form that carries a stream of global spirits. Traditionally, painters determined what they intended to represent from an assessment of their immediate physical environments: recording what they saw with their eyes and expressing their thoughts from their own consciousness. However, upon the advent of the digital era, AI and other advanced technological programs and games have shifted the artistic atmosphere. The majority of content we encounter in real life cannot escape the global network of technology, whether it is in the form of electromagnetic waves, wifi-signals, behavior cataloging via GPS, credit cards, browsing on the internet, playing within different game worlds, or editing in Adobe suite. All these forms of engagement are housed within a decentralized technological sphere revolving around us.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Q：你目前关注的话题有哪些？

A：我一直都很喜欢加密货币，以及像 Decentraland、The Sandbox 这样的去中心化游戏。我认为在NFT游戏中有更多的潜力和可能性，人们将能够玩超高清的游戏并真正拥有来自不同游戏、跨各种平台的物品，就像我们在现实生活中的收藏一样。但现在，我觉得这些游戏的视觉质量和成熟度还没有达到那个水平。我总是喜欢阅读奇幻或科幻小说，比如《Love after the End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction》、Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing 的《The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins》，或者《明日骄阳》等。

Q：What are your interested topics currently?

A：I have been a fan of cryptocurrency, and decentralized games such as Decentraland, The Sandbox, etc. I think there are a lot more potential and possibilities in NFT games where people will be able to play ultra-high-definition games and actually own items from different games across various platforms like our IRL collections. Right now, I feel like the visual quality and maturity of those games aren’t quite up there yet. I always enjoy reading fantasy, or sci-fi novels something like Love after the End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction, Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins, or 明日骄阳 （MingRiJiaoYang）, etc.

展览现场 Past Digitized Spirits

Aussi Chen所关注的话题正处于艺术与科技交汇的最前沿。从二十一世纪开始，人类长期以来对生命概念的理解被完全打破，亚里士多德的灵魂至上、笛卡尔机械论的灵肉二分、达尔文的进化论甚至都显得不再相关。我们对于生命体、精神、心智的认知被自动控制、系统论、人类工程学打破。一切变为后现代生命科学话语机制的产物，一切的交流变成了编码文本和智能网络的一部分。在人类面临整体失序和迷茫的虚拟现实时代，Aussi Chen探讨了人类主体的身份、体验和表达，重新融合了现实和虚拟的界限，具有深刻的现实和未来意义。

A：The topics Aussi Chen focuses on are at the forefront of the intersection of art and technology. Since the beginning of the 21st century, mankind's long-standing understanding of the concept of life has been completely broken. Aristotle's supremacy of soul, Cartesian mechanism of dichotomy between soul and body, and Darwin's theory of evolution are no longer even relevant. Our cognition of life body, spirit, and mind is broken by automatic control, system theory, and ergonomics. Everything becomes the product of the discourse mechanism of postmodern life science, and all communication becomes part of coded text and intelligent network. In the era of virtual reality where human beings are facing overall disorder and confusion, Aussi Chen explores the identity, experience and expression of human subjects, reintegrating the boundary between reality and virtuality, which has profound realistic and future significance.

黎扬扬 Annie Li Yangyang