To build a ‘Utopian Kingdom’ of personal style

　　A conversation between Wang Jing and Lv Shun

　　王静(以下简称王)：你曾谈到你对艺术有一种宗教式的信仰，这种信仰的感情应该是慢慢才能体会到的，你应该是慢慢才发现了艺术对你的重要性。在你的人生轨迹中，画画似乎意味着某种转折，谈谈你是如何开始绘画创作的吧。

　　Wang Jing (Hereinafter referred to as W): You have ever talked about your religious faith in art, which is a feeling that could only be appreciated gradually, so you must have realized the importance of art for you by and by through a long time. Painting seems to be a transition in your life, could you tell us your story about how did you started artistic creation?

　　吕顺(以下简称吕)：我是在挣扎的过程中找到绘画作为我事业和个人存在的支撑点，最后竟成了我精神的寄托。最初，绘画创作对我来说源于一种好奇，因为对艺术天生的兴趣，我考学时选择并考取了北京电影学院摄影专业，毕业后还做过了一段专业摄影。而人生的惊喜往往是在意外中收获的，1999年我偶然来到宋庄，竟莫名其妙地离不开这里了，我放弃了摄影决心留在宋庄画画。当把所有的积蓄都花光后，我仍然不知道自己该画什么，艰难的时候我甚至没有钱买一张回家的车票，看不到自己的出路，不过我并没有因为生活上的不顺心而放弃思考，当我把美术史嚼到品出味之后，慢慢感觉到我揭开了艺术的真面容。那时无意中卖掉了一些画，更给了我莫大的鼓舞。然后我把赚到的钱又全都投到了绘画中，反反复复，艰辛而有趣。

　　Lv Shun (Hereinafter referred to as L): It was in a struggling process when I found painting to be my career and support of self-existence; at last, painting even became my spiritual ballast. From the very beginning, painting creation for me was originated from curiosity, owing to my inborn interest in art, I chose Beijing Film Academy and passed the examination to become a student of its Photography Department. I even worked as a professional photographer after graduated for some time. However, pleasant amazement of life is always gained surprisingly, when I came to Song Zhuang Village, I couldn’t leave it without any reason, so gave up photography and determined to stay in Song Zhuang and paint here. When I ran out of all my money, I still had no idea about what to paint. Even to get some money for a ticket and go home was impossible for me when I was so poor. I couldn’t see my future at that time, yet difficulties in life never made me give up pondering, when I read the art history again and again until I tasted the flavor of it, I gradually felt that the true colors of art was revealed. At that time, some of my paintings were sold out unintentionally, which was of utmost encouragement for me. Then I used all that income into painting and sold paintings to gain back some money over and over, life was arduous yet interesting.

　　王：一种成熟创作方式的拓展对职业画家是一个关键节点，可能决定此后一段时间甚至更长时间的创作状态。而有意思的一点在于，相对学院出身的画家，你没有经过高强度的专业基础训练，你的创作是在职业化的过程中训练出来的，你的案例对正统的美术院校教育应该是一种挑战。

　　W: To explore a mature style for creation is a key point for professional artists, which might decide the status of one’s artistic creation in the period afterward, and this period might be longer than expectation. What is interesting is that, comparing with those artists who were educated in academy, you haven’t received professional fundamental training of high intensity, so your creation was trained during a process of professionalization. Your case should be a challenge to the orthodox education of academies of fine arts.

　　吕：我觉得我的基础还不错，因为从小就喜欢看书，而且喜欢声乐、摄影、绘画等艺术形式。摄影和绘画都是二维的，我在摄影语言向绘画语言转换的过程中体会到了更多变化。绘画是相对静止的，摄影是移动的，但这两者的画面都需要追求视觉的形式构成。摄影的画面完美展现同样需要色彩、构成、用光等要素发挥作用。人所探索的往往与他的潜质和长项有关。早期的摄影训练对我的画面把握能力有所帮助，比如在我的作品中，我把猪和花放在一起，我会注意对光的处理，不自觉地靠近电影的视觉。我觉得艺术的表达更多在于艺术家个人的修养，修养包括将自身熟悉的东方文化、不熟悉的西方文化都研究透彻，并对中国当代的一些社会问题有准确的洞察，只有具备这样的修养，才有可能在当代艺术上建构新的现实。我们不能再停留在古人的车辙中，当代艺术的发展需要艺术家不断探索具有时代特征的形式和思想，更要找到鲜明的个性化语言。

　　L: From when I was in my childhood, I loved reading and was fond of various artistic forms including vocal music, photography and painting, so I think I have good grounds. Both photography and painting are two-dimensional, thus I feel more variations in the course of transformation from photographical language towards painting language. Painting is relatively motionless while photography is motional; however, the visual form composition is pursued in the picture of both. It’s just the same with painting that elements like color, composition and light are necessary in showing a perfect photographic picture. What people explore into often have relation with his potentiality and advantage. Photographical training in earlier years was of some help to my capability in controlling picture, for example, when I put pig and flower side by side in my artistic work, I would pay attention to deal with light, and approach the visual effect of movie unconsciously. It strikes me that the self-cultivation of an artist is of more importance in artistic expression. Such a cultivation means thorough study of the familiar eastern culture and the unfamiliar western culture, as well as precise observation of some social problems in contemporary China, only when someone possessed a cultivation like this could he construct a new reality in contemporary art. We could never halt in the track of the ancients, the development of contemporary art need artists to unceasingly explore the form and thought that are characteristic of the age, and what is more, to find a distinctive personalized language.

　　王：你已经逐渐找到属于自己的成熟的个性化语言系统。如今在当代艺术界，许多艺术家都在通过创造容易被识别的形象，或者长期创作某个形象来引起市场或评论界的关注。在绘画技法、绘画语言的实验性上寻求个性化，个性化风格对画家来说好像是一个“踏破铁鞋无觅处”的课题。

　　W: You have gradually found your own mature personalized language system. Nowadays in contemporary art circles, many artists are trying to raise concern from market and critics through producing easily distinguished images or creating same images for a long period. To search for personalization and personalized style in painting technique and language seems to be a topic like ‘after travelling far and wide in search of it nothing could be found’.

　　吕：个性化风格对艺术家来说的确很重要。架上绘画已经达到了一定的高度，要实现新突破的确有难度，但一个真正的艺术家，若呈现不出自己的风格，就相当于没有自己发言的工具和手段。而以怎样的形式呈现是很重要的。没有形式载体，如何寄托思想?我早期研究过八大、金农、杜尚、贾科梅第等艺术家的作品。我的画里就吸收了许多贾科梅第的感觉，他永远不会在他的画里出现对与错的判断，他的作品的拓展好像永远没有完结的时候，所以我对他的东西特别喜欢。艺术家应该学习，但学而不变通，终究还是别人的。所以做艺术必须要有个性化的东西，找到之后就斩钉截铁地进展它。

　　L: Personalized style is really important for artist. It is quite difficult to realize new breakthrough when easel painting had already reached a fairly high level. But as a genuine artist, his lack of personal style in representation means that he has no tool or medium to speak. Yet the form of representation is also important. Without the form as a vehicle, how could ideas be expressed? In my early years, I had ever studied the works of artists like Bada Shanren (Zhu Da, c.1626-1705), Jin Nong (Chinese traditional artist, one of the Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou in Qing Dynasty, 1687-1764), Marcel Duchamp and Alberto Giacometti. I absorbed in my painting many sense of Giacometti, who would never show right or wrong judgment in his paintings, it seems that the exploration of Giacometti’s work is endless forever, so I have a special love of his art. Artist should learn from others, but to learn without flexibility you acquire nothing for yourself. Therefore, you should have something personalized to do art, and carry it forward once and for all when you find it.

　　王：艺术家的关注点和创作的初衷往往因个人经历，背景、生存环境、性格而不同，并与创作密切相关。能不能谈谈你的关注点？你的画中如何体现出你的观点?从最早的《动物的快感》开始，一直到后来的《绿野仙猪》，以及最近的《天籁之音》，你给作品取一些听上去很美好的名字，但我感觉里边含有隐喻的意味。

　　W: Artists’ concerns and original intentions of creation are often disparate due to different self-experiences, backgrounds, living environments and characteristics, they are closely related to artistic creation, too. Could you talk about your concerns? How do you express your view in your paintings? From your earliest work ‘Pleasant sensation of Animal’ (Dongwu de kuaigan), to your later one ‘Fairy pigs in wonderland’ (Lvye xianzhu), and then your recent work ‘Sound of nature’ (Tianlai zhi yin), you gave your works some sound beautiful name, but I could feel some metaphor in them.

　　吕：在我的语言体系中，我把猪当作一种具有高贵忧伤情绪的生灵。高科技无疑对社会形态的进步具有必要性，但工业革命以后，人类的战争与工业化建设带来的环境破坏生态失衡等毁灭性问题，使人和动物成了牺牲品。人与人之间的思想距离也越来越明确，这对人类社会是一种伤害。我画《动物的快感》是因为感到了动物在攻击、反抗人类。这种想法或许跟我的潜意识中的关注点有关。我后来画的一些花让人感到灿烂、繁华、但骨子里却渗透出忧郁、麻木甚至有些伤感的调子，光线虚无缥缈地闪烁。到后来我画的《绿野仙猪》是在城市边缘的垃圾堆上动物本能地“交配”。垃圾是人类生活的产物，具有原生态意味的动物交配选择在垃圾堆里进行，而我把垃圾也描绘得灿烂至极，我想用这样灿烂来映衬糜烂，这样产生的语言效果会更强而有力，对人的冲击也更大。

　　L: In my language system, pig is a living creature with noble melancholic mood. High technology is undoubtedly necessary for the advancement of social formation, yet after the Industrial Revolution, human warfare and industrial construction led to fatal problems like environmental decay and ecological unbalance, which made human beings and animals the sacrificial lamb. The distance of thought between peoples is also clearer and larger day by day, it’s an injury for human society. I paint ‘Pleasant sensation of Animal’ to express my awareness of animals’ attack and rebel against human. This idea might have something to do with my concerns in my subconsciousness. Later I painted some flowers seems to be brilliant and flourishing, yet melancholic, numb and even sad tones were permeated from inner side of them, and the light was flickering shapelessly and illusively. Later, in my painting titled ‘Fairy pigs in wonderland’, animals were mating instinctively on the rubbish dump at the edge of city. Rubbish is a production of human life, animal mating which has a primitive ecological meaning was chosen to happen in a rubbish dump, which was extremely brilliant under my brush. I hope to set off corrupt debauchery by brilliance, thus the effect of my language would be much more powerful.

　　王：谈到中国当代艺术的创作，往往会涉及后现代语境问题。后现代主义并不仅仅是将旧的美术生态和秩序解构之后的重新构建。西方的后现代主义在中国的现实中是否具有文化效力是值得探讨的，你怎样看待“后现代”对中国艺术家的影响？

　　W: When we talk about creation of contemporary art in China, issues of post-modernist context are always involved. Post-modernism is not merely a re-construction of the deconstructed old artistic Eco and order. Whether or not the western post-modernism has cultural efficacy in Chinese reality is worth discussing. How do you think about the influence of ‘post-modernism’ on Chinese artist?

　　吕：中国并没有真正的后现代，所谓的后现代是西方的翻版，并非是本土的概念。艺术家真正需要思考的应该是如何在新时期的冲击下，树立起中国美术真正的当代性。很多人现在就是在抄、窃，我不喜欢这种艺术家。绘画有三个重要元素，个性化语言、形式感和思想。中国当代艺术一直注重解构，但大多缺乏解构的力量，只是进行恶性循环。比如将方力钧的光头和张晓刚的眼睛“二合一”，再加上别人的东西“三合一”、“四合一”。我想艺术家应该思考、建构具有个人特征的语言系统和全新元素。

　　L: There is no real post-modernism in China, the so called post-modernism comes from western countries and is not a native concept. What should our artists think about is how to build up a true contemporary nature of Chinese art against the impact of the new period. Many people are just copying and stealing today, I don’t like them. Personalized language, sense of form and thought are the three important elements in painting. Chinese contemporary artists always pay attention to deconstruction, but most of them lack the power of deconstruction, and fall into a vicious circle. For example, some artists used Fang Lijun’s bold head symbol and Zhang Xiaogang’s eye symbol to make ‘two-in-one’ works and add other artist’s symbols to make ‘three-in-one’ and ‘four-in-one’ works. I think, artist should reflect and construct a language system of personal characteristics and brand-new elements.

　　王：易英教授就认为西方当代文化概念中的后现代主义对中国的当代艺术并没有实质的意义，与其说当前的中国艺术界对后现代的茫然是出于无知，还不如说是一种态度。能不能谈谈在当下文化语境中，艺术家应保持怎样的创作态度？

　　W: According to Professor Yi Ying, post-modernism as a western contemporary cultural concept, is of no essential meaning in Chinese contemporary art. It’s better to say that the absent-minded situation of Chinese artistic circles towards post-modernism is an attitude rather than ignorance. Could you tell us your opinion about what attitude of creation should an artist keep under the contemporary cultural context?

　　吕：艺术家应该全程理性地思考周遭的社会和生存的物质与精神世界的环境。对我而言，这可能是一种生命体验的结果，之前我考虑更多的是动物本能的原始矛盾，捕捉生命感性情绪的快感。当时年轻气盛，对形式语言的表达实际上有一种强烈愿望存在于潜意识之中。而现在我更力图寻找带有个人符号化的四维空间，一种有意味的形式得以延续和深入的体验。对待艺术、对待生活，凭借更加理性的视角洞察现有的艺术问题，持有这样一个理性态度，我感觉在创作中是必需的。

　　L: Artist should always be rational in pondering our surrounding society and our material and spiritual world in which we are living. For me, this might be a result of experiencing life. Prior to this, I considered more about the primitive conflicts of animal instinct and captured pleasant sensation of perceptual mood in life. At that time, I was young and a kind of fierce hope for expressing formal language existed in my unconsciousness, yet now, I make more effort to find a four-dimensional space with personalized symbol, it’s an experience that a meaningful form could be extended and penetrated deeply. Stand on a more rational viewpoint to observe existing artistic problems both in everyday life and in art and keep such a rational attitude is quite necessary in artistic creation in my mind.

作者：孙越（译）