当我在一个春日的下午踏进张雷平的工作室，依约对她进行访谈时，我看到她那不大的工作室几乎被两块大画板简单搭就的桌子占满了，桌面上摊着很多的图片，近看都是些已经过整理的作品照片，和画家自己的一些工作、生活照。屋内的墙面上也没有空的地方，错落地挂着她新近创作的形式感特别强的黑白色调山水组画，和几幅更早些时候画的花卉、风景，也都是墨色饱满浓郁、笔力遒劲奔放一路的。我们在画室中对坐着，开始了聊天式的问答，张雷平以一贯温婉沉静的语气叙述她最近的工作和活动。只是当说到刚刚又去了一次云南元阳梯田时，她的语气不由得兴奋起来，镜片后的眼睛也更亮了……交谈继续着，话题也越来越广，从学画背景、从艺经历，到行游各地、独创风格，从个人理想、文化抱负到女性问题……渐渐，窗外的天光暗下去，夜色起来，屋内仍意犹未尽。当我们下楼，在街边的路灯树影下挥手告别时，我的内心产生了异样的感觉，我感到我用心看到了一个更丰富真实的画家张雷平。

　　回顾张雷平早期的学艺经历，她出身于艺术世家，家学渊源，父亲张明曹是国内知名的版画家、连环画家，但国画创作却是其终生所好，平素极爱舞文弄墨，与唐云、程十发、朱屺瞻、谢之光等很多上海老一辈的国画家相熟。张雷平从小在父亲身边，看着父亲和他的这些朋友们经常在一起挥毫泼墨、谈书论艺，那种自由无拘的艺术状态令她幼小的内心非常羡慕和向往。耳濡目染间，也让她对中国画，对笔墨、宣纸有天然的亲近和好感，为她日后从事水墨画创作埋下了伏笔。

　　然而冥冥中命运似乎总是有着自己的独特安排。1964年，因浙江美术学院当年没有招生，抱着试试看的心情参加高考的张雷平顺利考上了上海戏剧学院舞台美术系。学院教育以西画为主，中国画为辅。自小在中国画氛围中成长的张雷平，踏入了一个新的学习环境。这是20世纪60年代中后期，正值苏联绘画教育体系一统国内美术教育的时代，张雷平科班学习了苏式绘画，但却对当时流行的那种“酱油色调”的油画提不起丝毫的兴趣。她渴望吸收新鲜的东西，学院藏书颇丰的图书馆吸引了她，图书馆里有印象派的画册，印象派画家们明亮绚烂的色彩和复杂变幻的光影所表现的大自然充满了生机与神韵，一下子吸引了有着强烈好奇心与求知欲的年轻画家的心。本能地，她开始临摹和学习印象派的作品，甚至尝试着用印象派的方法和视角去实景写生。在色彩的跃动和笔触的书写中她体验到强烈的自由和快感，感受到绘画所赋予自己的艺术冲动与激情。这是画家艺术生涯中的一次“开蒙”,如果说少时倾慕父执辈的国画家们作画时洒脱不羁风姿是出于一种对艺术创作自由状态的喜爱，那么对西方印象派的绘画观念、色彩、光线以及笔触等表现语言的一见倾心则显示出在艺术的本质层面上她的感性直觉与审美趣味所做出的真实选择。事实上，这也内在地暗示了画家未来绘画之路的可能性方向，显然它将不会是工谨、细腻、柔美、素丽的婉约派了，画家性格中的不安分以及情感上的张力已然初现端倪。

　　对印象派绘画的学习是快乐的。但毕业后想要开始从事真正创作的张雷平面临着新的问题。如何将少时起就喜爱的国画的表现力与大学时热衷的西方现代绘画的形式与色彩相结合画出自己的画来呢?年轻的张雷平此时的思考，其实是20世纪西风东渐、中西文化碰撞以来，几代中国艺术家集体思考和实践的一个大命题，而不同时代的艺术家，大抵只能站在自己的知识坐标和文化方位上进行抉择和实验。早期的徐悲鸿、刘海粟、林风眠、傅抱石、潘天寿等如是，后来的石鲁、吴冠中、方增先、周韶华等亦如是。这些具有远见卓识的先行者们在他们的时代里，针对传统艺术如何进行现代转型的问题，广泛地对中西方艺术进行研究和学习，融入他们个人的文化判断、艺术理想和美学趣味，经过艰辛的探索和努力，才洞开中国绘画现代性的一个个天窗。

　　学院毕业后的张雷平，此时面对的是1960年代末至1970年代那样一个特殊而封闭的社会文化环境，视野之内能够获取的艺术资源非常有限。在一次次地将油画与国画进行生硬结合失败后，面对那些“呆滞”、“浑浊”、“毫无生气”的“生搬硬套”地画在宣纸上的作品，张雷平决定还是要深入传统中去，要真正掌握中国画的特性和技法，要学到中国画的精髓，非如此自己很难创作出真正有文化底蕴的作品来，也很难建立具备说服力的个人艺术面貌。

　　在上海，学习中国画最为得天独厚的条件就是海派绘画的传承有序。海派绘画中，又以在写意花鸟上的创新贡献最突出，其重要特点即是引书法用笔入画，不拘泥程式，风格随时代而变，如大胆采用艳丽的西洋绘画色彩和增添新兴市民阶层的审美趣味等等，这些变革事实上为逐渐衰落的传统花鸟画开辟了新的局面。张雷平凭着自己的心性，首学海派巨擎吴昌硕的大写意花卉，并在吴派传人的指导下苦练书法，还向父亲的友人朱屺瞻、程十发等先生求教。在这个阶段，张雷平像海绵一样广泛地吸收各种教益，努力地磨练着自己的笔性和墨技。

　　学生时代养成的写生习惯依然保持着，张雷平将之视为形成自己绘画面貌的有效途径。写生时对所见之物象进行细致的观察和提炼，在脑海中形成的图像最终要通过系统化的视觉语言来进行表达。此时，经过传统技法磨练的张雷平已能够娴熟地运用笔墨在宣纸上发力，而从西方印象派画家那里学习的色彩表现和形式构成技巧，也经过无数次的试验逐渐地与中国的笔墨在画面中获得和谐统一。

　　张雷平的创作以学习吴派绘画为肇始，吴昌硕金石书法入画的大写意花卉对她影响很深，在她的早期创作(主要指1980年代的作品)中大写意花卉也占了相当大的比重，后来山水的比重虽日益增加，但写意花卉这一路的创作始终未曾间断。考察张雷平不同时期的花卉作品，可以很清晰地看到她的绘画语言与风格是如何从吴派写意一步步发展、变化，最终独立出来。

　　与传统的海派写意画相比，张雷平的那些1990年代中期以后创作的花卉题材作品，显然有着新的气象。她的笔墨虽直接师承海派中的吴昌硕一脉，得其朴茂浓郁之要旨，但却更富于个人的情感色彩和现代的形式探究意味。由于绘画手法上的书写性特征和传情达意的特点，虽仍可称之为写意画，但已与传统意义上的写意画相去甚远了，因为无论是画面的形式还是表达的情感已然都是现代的了。正是这些个人画风上凸显出来的新倾向、新变化，令张雷平很快在海上画坛脱颖而出。

　　上个世纪90年代，虽然在花卉创作上已取得相当的成功，但在艺术探索上永远充满着渴求的张雷平又将很多的精力投入进了山水画的创作。综览张雷平这个阶段的山水作品，会发现她对自然的描绘总是在不遗余力地展示其雄浑厚重的身姿、动人心魄的气势和强大神秘的力量。而我以为这样的山水既是画家走出喧嚣都市，在苍茫大地、蛮荒自然中行走时的眼中所见，其实也是她一直以来的心中所求。她希望在其中获得新的艺术启示与力量，从而开拓自己在艺术创作上的新气象。故而当她面对这样的自然伟力时，是被深深地震撼和征服的，她发自肺腑地要以自己的笔墨来表现它，歌颂它，在对它的塑造中也将自己的情感与理想深深地投注进去。

　　像创作于1990年代中期的《海礁》、《峡谷之光》、《山峦月色》、《峡谷雾锁》等较早期的山水作品，自然的雄奇与沧桑、神秘与深邃已被画家用粗犷有力的表现性手法进行了生动的描绘，尤为难得的是对于笔墨和色调的处理，已显示出某种举重若轻的平衡掌握，也即于笔墨的厚重中蕴含呼吸，于色调的深沉中显现灵动。其后的作品更是多在语言上下功夫，如审慎地对画面层次进行丰富铺陈，对作品中的各种细节进行完善交待，并最终以温润的墨气、色韵将它们统一于总体格局之中。作品《交河古城》即为典型，人类的文明遗迹在沧海桑田的时间流转中成为广袤大自然的一部分，画家以现代构成的方式对其进行提炼和概括，以线条、块面与土红色调的有机结合来展现其古朴和神奇，怀古之幽情跃然纸上。

　　慢慢地，随着时间的流逝，画家对自然山水的体验也在变化，由最初的激动仰慕和倾力表现渐渐转化为对形式语言的经营和画面诗意的传达。所以，再看张雷平近几年的山水作品，会感到在画面结构上的一种有意识的放松，塑造的因素减弱，书写的分量增强，山水的形态基本以线条来勾勒，再施以墨彩。在《水墨山田》、《晨光初露》等作品中，那些按着一定方向流动的线条，似于迂回婉转中积蓄着能量，在墨彩的衬托下，山水天地氤氲一片，以简约的构成，营造出混茫的宇宙感。这个系列中，也不乏玩味视觉的游戏，将轻松的线条与明亮的色块进行构成的，如《彩色的山田》、《山田多彩虹》等作品，山水的形态已不再重要，线与色的唱和、抒情成为主调，几乎已是抽象画了。不过，无论作品是具象还是偏于抽象，繁笔还是简笔，朴拙厚笃的气质始终得以延续。

　　张雷平近年的一些山水作品，其对观念的强调和纯形式探索的重视显然已超出通常意义上的山水画概念，而带有某种当代实验水墨的味道了。其实，这样的探索她在1990年代就曾做过一些尝试，相信这个系列在她未来的创作中还会继续地发展下去。可以说，张雷平四十多年来在水墨道路上不断探索的艺术实践经验，已经为传统水墨画如何完成现代性转换和当代化发展提供了一个非常有价值的案例，而她在写意花卉和山水画创作中所建立的个性化水墨语言无疑也为当代的水墨画创作谱系增添了新的内容与范式。丹青源自造化，造化成就丹青，张雷平通过多年来的行走和思考所创作的一系列作品，充分地展现出一位当代水墨艺术家对“外师造化，中得心源”的体悟与实践。

　　法国巴比松画派著名画家柯罗说过这样的话：“我虽然在细心地追求和模仿自然，但却一刻也没有失去抓住感动我心灵的刹那。现实是艺术的一部分，只有情感才是艺术的全部，如果真正地打动了心灵的话，我们真挚的感情是会传播给他人的。”纵观张雷平多年来的水墨探寻之路，不也正是以真挚的感情作为动力的么?

　　江梅

　　策展人

　　Painting of Nature:Zhang Leiping's Explorations of Ink Art

　　In the afternoon of a spring day, I stepped into Zhang Leiping’s studio, and interviewed her according our appointment. I found the moderate-sized studio was mostly occupied by a simple desk consisting of two large pieces of drawing boards, and there were many pictures lying on the desk. When watching closely, I found those were photos of her works that had been sorted out, and also some photos of the painter’s life and work. There was almost no space left on the walls, as the walls were covered by her recent black-and-white landscapes with a strong sense of form, and some earlier flower and landscape paintings, which all belonged to the style of strong and thick ink color and the vigorous and unrestrained brushwork. Sitting face to face in the studio, we began the interview like chatting, and Zhang talked about her recent work and activities in her usual gentle and quiet tone. However, when she mentioned her recent another trip to the terraced fields in Yuanyang, Guizhou province, her tone involuntarily became excited, and her eyes behind the glasses also lighted up… With our conversation continuing, the topics became increasingly more extensive, from the background of learning painting and the experiences of art career to the travels to various places and the unique style, from her individual ideal and cultural ambition to women’s problems… Gradually, the sky outside the window darkened, and the curtain of night fell down, however, we still felt reluctant to end our conversation. After going downstairs and waving goodbye to each other under the streetlight and tree shadow beside the street, I had a weird feeling that I saw a more profuse and real painter Zhang Leiping.

　　Reviewing Zhang’s early experiences of learning painting, we find it could be described as smooth. She was born in a family with a tradition of art. Her father Zhang Mingcao was a renowned domestic print artist and picture-story book painter, however Chinese painting was his life-long hobby. He loved painting and writing, and was familiar with many Shanghai Chinese painters of the elder generation, such as Tang Yun, Cheng Shifa, Zhu Qizhan, Xie Zhiguang, and etc. Staying with her father since childhood and always seeing her father painting and chatting with his friends, Zhang really admired and looked forward to their free and unrestrained status of art creation. Unconsciously influenced by what her frequent hearing and seeing, she naturally found paintbrush and rice paper familiar and intimate, which laid a foundation for her later engagement in the creation of ink painting.

　　If she were cultivated under the circumstances of such a family and learned Chinese painting in the traditional way of being taught by a teacher, she would have become a quite good Chinese painter of traditional style, however, definitely not the current Zhang Leiping engaged in the creation of modern ink painting.

　　However, fate always seems to have her own arrangements. In 1964, as the Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts didn’t recruit any student that year, Zhang Leiping participated in the entrance examination for college to take a chance and was enrolled in the department of stage art, Shanghai Theatre Academy. The academy’s education mainly focused on western painting, teaching Chinese painting as a complement. Having grown up in the atmosphere of Chinese painting, Zhang entered a completely new learning environment. It was the middle and later stages of the 1960s, the era when the education system of Russian painting dominated the domestic art education, and Zhang systematically learned Russian-styled painting, however, she was definitely uninterested in the lifeless ‘dark-toned’ oil painting popular at that time. She desired to absorb fresh things, and the profuse collection in the library of the academy attracted her. There were painting albums of impressionism, and the nature under the paintbrush of impressionists was presented with the brilliant and bright colors and the complicated and changeful light and shadow, and was full of vitality and fascination, immediately attracting the young student with strong curiosity and thirst for knowledge. Instinctively, she started to copy and study the works of impressionism, even trying to sketch with means and perspective of impressionism. Among the dynamic colors and brushstrokes, she experienced the strong feelings of freedom and joy, perceiving the art impulsion and passion bestowed by painting, which was an initiation of the painter’s art career. If she admired the easy and unrestrained demeanor of the Chinese painters of the elder generation out of fondness for the free status of art creation, then the instant admiration for the expressive language of western impressionism’s painting concepts, color, light and brushstroke indicated the true selection out of her perceptual instinct and aesthetic interest in terms of art’s nature. As a matter of fact, this also internally implied the painter’s possible direction in the future way of painting, and obviously it would not be the meticulous, exquisite, gentle, graceful and restrained style, as the restlessness in her character and the tension of her emotion had already begun to emerge.

　　Learning impressionistic painting was happy, however, Zhang wishing to be engaged in real creation after graduation was confronted with the new problem. How to integrate the expression of her favorite Chinese painting since childhood with the form and color of modern western painting that she was absorbed into during college to create paintings of her own? The young painter’s consideration was actually a major proposition of several generations of Chinese artists’ collective considerations and practices since the gradual influence of western arts and the collision of Chinese and western arts in the 20th century, and artists of different eras could only make choices and experiments from their own perspectives of knowledge coordinates and cultural orientations, so were Xu Beihong, Liu Haisu, Lin Fengmian, Fu Baoshi, Pan Tianshou and some other artists during the early stage, and then Shi Lu, Wu Guanzhong, Fang Zengxian, Zhou Yunhua and others in the later stage. During their times, aiming at the problem of how the traditional art transforming into the modern art, these far-sighted pioneers extensively studied and researched on Chinese and western arts, incorporated their individual cultural judgments, art ideals and aesthetic interests into them, and then made breakthroughs in the modernity of Chinese painting with painstaking explorations and efforts.

　　After graduating from the academy, Zhang faced the special and secluded environment of social culture from the end of the 1960s to the 1970s, and could only obtain very limited art resources within her vision. After the failures of rigid integration between oil painting and Chinese painting, Zhang faced those ‘dull, turbid, and lifeless’ works on rice paper, and decided to probe deep into traditions, really grasping the characteristics and techniques of Chinese painting, and capturing the essence of Chinese painting, otherwise, she could hardly create works with true cultural connotations, and not to mention establishing convincible individual art appearance.

　　In Shanghai, the most favorable condition of learning Chinese painting was the continuous and consistent inheritance. Among Shanghai-styled paintings, the innovative accomplishment of freehand flower-and-bird painting was the most conspicuous, and its important characteristics were to introduce the brushwork of calligraphy into painting, to go beyond routine, to change style according to the time, to boldly apply brilliant colors of western painting, to add the aesthetic interests of the newly rising class of citizens, and etc. These innovations actually opened up a new pattern for the gradually declining traditional flower-and-bird painting. According to her own temperament, Zhang firstly learned freehand flower painting from Wu Changshuo, a master of Shanghai-styled panting, assiduously practiced calligraphy with instruction from Wang Geyi and Cao Jianlou, the descendants of Wu’s school, and asked for advice from her father’s friends, such as Zhu Qizhan, Cheng Shifa, and etc. During this stage, Zhang extensively absorbed various nourishments like sponge, and endeavored to temper her brushwork and ink techniques.

　　Zhang still maintains the habit of sketching cultivated during her days as a student, and regards it as an efficient way to form her own painting appearance. When sketching, she would carefully observe and refine the objects, form images in her mind, and eventually express them with systematic visual language. By then, through the tempering of traditional techniques, Zhang could already skillfully apply brushwork to exert strength on rice paper; through countless attempts of experimentation, she was able to harmoniously incorporate the color expression and techniques of formal composition learned from western impressionists into the brushwork of Chinese painting.

　　Zhang’s creation was initiated by learning Wu’s school, and Wu Changshuo’s freehand flower painting with the characteristic of metal-and-stone styled calligraphy greatly influence her. In her creation of the early stage (mainly the works created in the 1980s), freehand flower paintings took a huge proportion. Though the proportion of landscape painting gradually increased, the creation of freehand flower painting has never stopped. Appreciating the flower paintings of her different stages, we may clearly discern the step-by-step development of her painting language and style from Wu’s school’s free hand to the eventual independence.

　　Compared with the traditional Shanghai-styled freehand painting, these of Zhang’s works on the theme of flower created in the middle of the 1990s obviously present a refreshing atmosphere. Though her brushwork directly inherited from Wu Changshuo’s school among Shanghai styles and captured its flourishing and exuberant gist, it was more permeated with the individual emotional tincture and the probing significance of modern form. Due to the calligraphic characteristics and the expressive traits in terms of painting means, though they could still be regarded as freehand painting, they were already quite distant from freehand painting in the traditional sense, as no matter the painting’s form or the expressed emotion, all were already modern. Just because of these new tendencies and new changes of personal style, Zhang soon became conspicuous in painting circles in Shanghai.

　　Though she obtained success in the creation of flower painting, when being compared with her accomplishment in creation of landscape painting from the middle of the 1990s, the creation of flower painting was more like a ‘rehearsal’ for creating landscapes in a certain sense. Once Zhang’s landscapes came into the public’s view, the maturity of her art expression was surprising and admirable. For instance, in the relatively early landscapes created in the middle of the 1990s, such as Sea Ridges, Light of Valley, Fog-Blocked Valley, and etc, the natural magnificence and vicissitudes, mystery and profundity, all were vividly depicted by the painter through rough and powerful means of expression, and what’s especially valuable was the disposal of brushwork and color tone, which had already manifested some sort of seemingly easy and balanced grasp, that is, the thickness and heaviness of brushwork contained respiration, and the color tone’s profundity showed flexibility. In the following works, she made more efforts in terms of language, such as cautiously arranging profuse layers in the painting, perfectly presenting various details, and finally unifying them in the general pattern with gentle and moist ink ‘qi’ (spirit) and color rhyme. The work Moonlight upon Chain of Mountains created in 2000 is one of the representative works, the compactness and closeness in terms of composition, the efficient but unscrupulous and unrestrained brushwork, and the austere and confident style, all these are highly noticeable and meaningful. In the work Ancient City in Jiaohe created in the same period, the relics of humankind’s civilization transformed into one part of the extensive nature through vicissitudes. The painter refined and summarized it in the way of modern composition, applied the organic combinations of lines, blocks and the tone of terracotta to embody the ancient simplicity and mystery, vividly expressing the feeling of meditation on the past.

　　Comprehensively reviewing Zhang’s landscape paintings in this stage, we could find her depiction of the nature always endeavored to manifest its magnificent and solemn demeanor, the amazing vigor, and the powerful and mysterious strength. I reckon, such landscapes were what the painter saw during her walk through the boundless earth and the desolate nature after getting out of the clamorous city, and also actually what she had longed for all the time. She expected to obtain new art enlightenment and strength from these, so as to exploit new realm in her own art creation. Thus, when facing such natural powers, she was deeply shocked and conquered. From the bottom of her heart, she whole-heartedly wished to express it and eulogize it with her own brushwork, and invested her deep emotion and ideal into it during the course of molding it.

　　Slowly, with time flying, her experiences about the natural landscapes also changed, from the initial excitement, admiration and strenuous presentation into the management of formal language and the delivery of poetic elements in the painting. Hence, when appreciating Zhang’s landscape paintings created in recent years, we may discern a certain sort of intentional relaxation in the painting’s composition, the element of molding decreases, the proportion of writing increases, the shapes of landscapes are mainly basically outlined with lines, and the ink colors are applied. In the works of Ink Mountain Fields, First Appearance of Morning Light, and etc, those fluent lines in a certain direction seem to accumulate energy among deviations. Set off by the ink colors, the landscape, the sky and the earth seem to be misty in a whole, building up the sense of a chaotic universe with concise composition. In this series, there are also games playing with vision, composing with relaxed lines and bright color blocks, such as Colorful Mountain Fields, Frequent Rainbows in Mountain Fields, and etc, as the shape of landscape is no longer important, the correspondence and feeling-expression between line and color prevails, and they are almost abstract paintings. However, no matter the works are representational or abstractly inclined, complicated brushwork or simple brushwork, the simple, unsophisticated and sincere temperament could always be continued.

　　Observing some of Zhang’s very ‘formalistic’ landscape paintings in recent years, we may find her emphasis on concept and the concern about pure formal exploration have obviously exceeded the concept of landscape in the normal sense, getting the tincture of certain contemporary experimental ink art. As a matter of fact, she had made some attempts of such exploration in the 1990s, and we believe this series would continue to develop in her future creation.

　　Zhang’s experiences of art practice keeping exploring on the way of ink art for more than 40 years have already provided a valuable case for how traditional ink painting realizing the transformation of modernity and the development of contemporaneity, and the individualized ink language during her creation of freehand flower and landscape paintings has undoubtedly added new contents and patterns into the creation system of contemporary ink painting. Her painting originates from the nature, and the nature contributes to her painting. Through a series of works created through many years of wandering and consideration, Zhang fully manifests the comprehension and practice of a contemporary ink artist about ‘learning from the external nature and integrating internal comprehension to create outstanding works’.

　　J.B.C. Corot, a renowned painter of the Barbizon school in France, once said, ‘Though I carefully pursue and imitate the nature, I have never missed capturing the moment that my heart is touched. Reality is one part of art, and only emotion is the whole of art. If heart is really touched, our sincere feelings would be delivered to others.’ When we comprehensively review Zhang Leiping’s way of exploring ink art for so many years, doesn’t she apply sincerity as the motive?

　　Jiang Mei

　　Curator

作者：江梅