雷子人在80年代末走进北京，在这里开始了他作为一个专业画家的水墨生涯。整个90年代，中国画在中国当代艺术的发展中貌似平衡，但却孕育着强劲的变革动力。面对西方艺术潮流的冲击，在“危机论”与“笔墨中心论”的不断争论中，传统中国画与学院写实主义的一统天下分化为不同的艺术取向，传统国画、学院水墨、实验水墨各行其道，“装置水墨”的出现揭示出中国画的边界已达最大张力。目睹中国画的风云际会，领受不同水墨流派的滋润，不经意间，雷子人这一代青年画家已经卓然成长，具有了自己的个性与审美追求。

　　90年代初期雷子人与油画界的“新生代”在作品的形式上有异曲同工之趣。60年代出生的这一代青年画家与80年代新潮美术家的最大区别，在于他们没有那种“胸怀祖国，放眼世界”的英雄主义与救世理想，而是在平凡的日常生活中用异样的眼光观察物象，从中获得异样的感受。1993年雷子人的毕业创作《丽日高原》画一群安塞老汉玩门球，静穆的人像高原的山，人和球一起缓缓流动，令人恍惚。这一时期的《丽日公园》和《丽日海滨》都是以都市人在自然环境中的日常活动表现一种向往田园的心境，这实际上是一种现代文人的画，即以一种受过传统水墨训练的画家眼光观察和表现都市的生存心态。和新生代画家不同，雷子人的作品更具有“文气”与“童心”。他的作品，没有重大题材绘画中所常有的戏剧化冲突与亢奋，也没有愤世妒俗与肆意变形。在形象上，有少男少女的青春缱绻与天真无邪；在笔墨上，可以看出对八大山人的结构布局和对傅抱石《丽人行》一类作品水墨韵味的文脉继承。有论者敏锐地指出，雷子人实际上是在画时间。他的画中那些游丝般纤细的线条，薄云似的柔美色彩，在山林中梦游似的花季少女的淡淡的迷惘和忧郁，一如波提切利和郁特里约的画中流溢出的对青春和生命的伤逝。这是画家早年生活与心灵的记忆——青春如云，如梦，如幻，令人无法忘怀而又难以把握。雷子人在以后的创作中那样喜爱风筝的意象，将画面视为一个心灵的空间，让个人的想像自由飘荡，这显示了他对于个体内心情绪的细腻与敏感。童话般的田园诗意，是为了追寻失落的真实、飘逝的浪漫，呈现一个本真的自我，这种细腻入微的审美特质和对青春意象的品味低吟确立了雷子人的风格并延续至今。在泼墨与用线的结合中，雷子人也开始了对水墨色彩的思考。

　　世纪之交，雷子人再次者入中央美院，师从李少文先生攻读研究生。如同远离的游子回归故乡，在这里，他以勤奋的思考和创作再次探索中国画表现当代生活的新的可能性，试图越过技巧与材料的仪式进入现代人心性的表现。他将这种追求视为一种“入境”（INTO），即从生活的状态中品味出一些滋味，相信作品会承载真实的生活。从整体来，他更趋向于用某种私密语言把自己对生命的感叹讲述得清晰些——体验生命状态也许正是“入境”的真实含义。

　　雷子人的近期作品具有不同的审美趣味，显示出他正进入一个活跃的创作探索期，有许多新的想象与急切的试验。其中最主要的，我认为是他的视野日渐开阔，不是在中国画的内部解决风格上的笔墨趣味，而是着眼于中西两种不同的艺术审美原则的比较研究，并试图在中国画的传统基础上加以融合。早在1995年的“入境”三人展上，雷子人的两位同学展出的均是油画，这使他注意到打破画种间的界限，直面作品与作者相关联的意义，从此多了对油画的关注。1998年他开始试着画起了没画。他惊讶于雷诺阿极具写意风格的作品中弥漫着超乎神外的光辉，与玄而又神的中国画所追求的隐逸、玄妙相比，西画更为热情，更具有世俗的真实。中国画画家从宋代以后逐渐淡漠了现实物像给予人的视觉启迪，数百年来始终在为自己或替别人完善一个梦想成真的虚幻影像。就雷子人的个性来说，他属于那种内向、敏感、怀旧、充满灵性的人，倾向于感性实践。但是，对油画的关注，使他的近期创作中更多了一些理性思考和结构意识。以往那种在画面上随意游走的速写式生活片断，转化为近景特写中的人物形象的平面结构与色彩关系的研究。对此，雷子人称之为“情景模式”，他试图融合情感设计性地观照某一特定场景的姿态。

　　在他的一些以人体写生为基础的纸本水墨人体中，西方艺术史中常见的侧卧的女人体由于中国水墨材料的运用，获得了一种饱满但却更松动自然的视觉意象。与学院式的强调人体结构的课堂写生不同，这里的用笔用墨更着眼于整体的画面结构关系。在《有背景的人体》和《窗台旁的风景》这两幅作品中，风景与远景人物在空间中飘浮，突出了超现实的梦幻意境，对色彩与线的结合运用，达到了前所末有的强度，以至于我们很自然地联想到马蒂斯与林风眠。而在《水中花系列》中，以游泳为题材，将人体在自然中的舒展和相互关系表现得更为从容，人体的解剖学意义上的准确让位于某种设计性的“经营位置”。当然，我们仍能从他的作品中感受到对青春与纯洁生命状态的敏感和眷恋，这在《相爱的风景》系列作品中得到了淋漓尽致的表现。令我感动的不仅是人物沉浸于其中忘我相爱的境界，更让我惊异的是，雷子人运用了非常中国的水墨表现手法，却能将现代青年的心理状态表现得如此单纯而富于韵味。我十分欣赏《相爱的风景》之三与之七，这两幅作品有着相似而又不同的构图，但在表现的情绪和视觉风格上，却有着与传统壁画和水墨画所给予人的不同感受。在这里，局部形体的松动在整体的结构中更显出中国画所特有的“画意”。这种画意在雷子人画余时间临窗所绘的一些都市风景小品中更见随意，他对于水墨交融的自由用笔的掌握，使这些写生式的小品摆脱了常见的“水彩趣味”，保留了中国画的见心见性。

　　雷子人的创作，虽然有着题材相对狭窄的局限，但其中有着对生命的渴望与热情，他只想要一个吐露真情的空间。置身茫茫人海，生命的不稳定，令人无法确定一个明确的创作路向，但他作品中的忧郁、浪漫、不可名状的神经质，恰恰验证了中国画的精髓正在于它有着对宇宙生命进行观照的巨大潜能。在雷子人的作品中，对生命的敏感，是与中国画材料对情绪、感受反应的敏感相联系的，他试图用中国画的传统审美观念，溶于生命热情去寻求对现代人生活环境、心态的理解。这种生存的本能与渴望——对美好事物的向往和依恋，往往给予我们在观画时刹那间的感动，我们说不清在多大程度上这种审美感动是源于对往昔时光的眷恋还是对未来岁月的某种企盼。也许雷子人只是想留住一种风筝飘远般的美丽，他不厌其烦地描绘青春的恍惚与爱的执著，对俗世的功名利禄视而不见。我们在他的画中再一次感受到生命的短暂，在山林的阳光清流中，想像都市街道上那些往来如潮的人们将以怎样的心境进入生存。

　　Artistic Beauty Springs out of the Heart

　　- Recent Chinese painting works of Lei Ziren

　　Yin Shuangxi

　　In late 80s, Lei Ziren came to Beijing and started his Chinese wash painting career as a professional painter. The whole 90s witnesses a seemingly balanced development of Chinese painting while forceful impetus for renovation was under incubation. Confrontation of western art trends combined with constant argument between "claims of crisis" and "pen and ink centered theory" broke the unity of traditional Chinese painting and college realism into various artistic tropics. Traditional Chinese painting, college Chinese Monochromes and experimental Chinese Monochromes took their own way separately and the emergence of installation of ink painting indicated the largest extension of Chinese painting. Having witnessed the vicissitudes of Chinese painting and drawn inspirations from different schools of ink painting, the young artists of Lei Ziren's generation inadvertently grew up with their own personality and aesthetic pursuit.

　　In early 90s, despite different approaches, Li Ziren and the new generation of oil painting enjoyed equally satisfactory results. The biggest difference between the young painters born in the 60s and the 80s-born trendy artists lies in that the former tend to get unusual feelings from their different perspectives to observe the world in daily life rather than indulge in the heroism and salvation of "keeping the motherland in mind and looking to the whole world". Lei Ziren presented his graduate work - The Plateau on a Sunny Day in 1993. In this painting, a group of aged Ansai  people are playing gate ball. With the solemn mountains as the background, the moving people and ball render the audience a trance and mesmerizing feeling. His works The Park on a Sunny Day and The Seaside on a Sunny Day produced in the same period shared the same feature of expressing the desire for pastoral life through the description of the urban people's daily activities in nature. In fact, it is the modern painting style of observing and manifesting the urban habitus from the perspective of modern painters who had received traditional training on ink and wash. Distinguishing from the emerging painters, Lei Ziren is more focused on humanity and innocence in his works. The commonly used dramatic conflicts and intension in the grand paintings are rarely found in Lei's works, neither are cynicism and arbitrary distortion. What you can find is the zealous affection and pure innocence of adolescent guys and dolls. In terms of painting style, you can see the inheritance of Bada Shanren 's layout and the appeal of the Chinese monochromes manifested in many works such as Fu Baoshi's Beauties on Outing. Some critic once sharply pointed out that as a matter of fact, Lie Ziren is painting time. The gossamer-like fine lines, morbidezza color, as well as the mild alusia and melancholy of the adolescent girls strolling in the mountain forest, all of these resonate with the grief over the passing youth and life overflowing in Botticelli or Utrillo's paintings. That is the painter's memory about the early life and heart. Youth is just like moving cloud and transient dreams - so unforgettable and unpredictable. In his latter works, Lei Ziren has a special crush on the image of kite. Regarding the painting as the free zone for heart and mind, he will give full play to his imagination on the paper, which is, at the same time, the demonstration of subtlety and sensitivity of his inner emotion. The fairy charm of pastoral life is portrayed in pursuit of the lost authenticity and fleeted romance and to display the true ego of the painter. This exquisite aesthetic characteristics and subtle recalling of youth have shaped Lei Ziren's painting style and kept it alive. Amidst the combination of splashed ink and lines, Lei Ziren obtained more thinking about ink color.

　　At the turn of the 20th century, Lei Ziren re-entered China Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) and registered for graduate study under the supervision of Mr. Li Shaowen. Like a returned migrant, with his diligent thinking and inexhaustible creativity, he continued exploring the possibility of showcasing contemporary life through Chinese painting, aiming to go over techniques and materials to the direct expression of modern humanity. He names this pursuit as "INTO" which means in-depth appreciation from daily life and firm belief of the works to epitomize true life. On the whole, he prefers to articulate his personal inspirations from life in a private language. To experience real life may be the essence of "INTO".

　　A different aesthetic taste has been discovered in Lei Ziren's recent works, indicating the upcoming of his dynamic exploration stage during which there are plenty of new assumptions and eager trials. What I think contributes most to this prime time is his increasingly broadened vision which enables him to go beyond the washing gusto Chinese painting with an eye on the comparison between the different Chinese and Western aesthetic principles and integrate the western essence into the traditional base of Chinese painting. On the "INTO Exhibition of Three Chinese Painters" held earlier in 1995, all the works on display of the other two of Lie Ziren's classmates were oil paintings, which arouse him to break boundaries between different sorts of painting and face up to the correlation between works and authors. Since then on, he has shifted more focus on oil painting. He started his try on 没画 in 1998. He marveled at the mysterious splendor permeated in Renoir's enjoyable paintings. Compared with the solitude and fantasy in Chinese painting, the western paintings boast more passion and more reality of the secular world. Ever since the Song Dynasty, artist of traditional Chinese painting have showed more indifference to the visual enlightenment cast by real things and committed themselves to making illusory images through which to catch their or others' dreams. Speaking of personality, Lei Ziren is an introvert, sensitive, nostalgic and inspiring person with special interest in perceptual practice. His special focus on oil painting has infused more rational thinking and structure awareness in his recent works. The previous sketched slices of life freely have converted into delicate study of relevance between the flat structure and colors in close-up drawing of characters. By use of this "situational patterns", he is trying to reflect the posture of a specific setting with integration of emotional design.

　　In some of his paper ink nudes painted based on sketching of human body, the application of Chinese ink painting materials has rendered the common latericumbent women body in history of western art a more plump and relaxed visual image. Different from the academism's focus of body structure on the sketch class, the use of ink and water here concentrates more on the overall structure of the painting. In the two paintings Human Body with a Background and Scenery besides the Windowsill, the floating of both scenery and characters has highlighted the surrealist fantasy. Intensely combining of colors and lines reaches the historic record which makes it natural to associate with Matisse and Lin Fengmian .Taking swimming as the theme, the theories of Flowers in Water has better manifested the relaxed human body and their interrelationship. The accuracy in the sense of anatomy gives way to operating location via a specific design. It goes without saying that we can find his sensitivity and attachment to youth and pure life, which is revealed fully in the series of View of Love. What deeply touches my heart is not only the immersed and selfless love, but also the refreshing use of ink painting techniques which has vividly displayed the mentality of modern young people in a pure and charming way. I hold high appreciation of the third and seventh works in this series. With similar but different composition, the two works differ from the traditional wall painting and ink painting in emotion and visual style, thus generating a new feeling in the audience. The partly layout inset in the integral structure has highlighted the picturesqueness which is owned exclusively by Chinese painting and is more often and freely found in some cityscape sketches he paints by the window in his spare time. His proficient command of painting techniques by blending water and ink freely has ridden the stereotyped "delight of watercolor" off the sketches while retained the clearness of human heart and mind in Chinese painting.

　　Although confined to relatively narrow scope of subjects, Lei Ziren's works are filled with aspiration and enthusiasm for life. All he needs is some space to pour out his true feelings. The vicissitudes of life lead to uncertainty of creative direction. The melancholy, romance and indescribable nervousness are exactly the verification of the quintessence of Chinese painting - its tremendous potential to reflect the universe life . The sensitivity to life in Lei Ziren's works echoes with that of Chinese painting materials to sentiments and experience. He is trying to fuse his passion for life into the traditional aesthetics in search of thorough understanding of modern people's living environment and state of mind. This instinct and desire for life - longing and clinging to beautiful things is what touches our heart instantly at the first sight of his works. We cannot tell to what degree the attachment to Auld Lang Syne or the expectation for years to come has moved us. It is possible that in order to retain the beauty of the flying kite, he takes it no bother to describe the trance-like youth and ever-lasting love while turning a blind eye to earthly fame. We can re-feel the transiency of life in his paintings. The glinting rivers in mountain forest will make us think about in what mood the crowd of people deal with their existence.

作者：殷双喜