与以往《标准时代》、《我们这一代》、《城市梦想》等作品不同，著名的年轻艺术家高孝午的雕塑作品《软暴力》系列是自2008年以来的新实验，它在形式和观念上都有了新的转向，即作品在内涵上趋于社会批判性，而在形式上则趋于多元化和装置化。高孝午的艺术视点从物态虚拟和形式美学转向对社会和人文的思考和分析，即对今天城市化发展中滋生的诸多问题的关注和分析——常常视而不见的事物。他把视觉图像、语言方式、媒体话语以及心理反应理解成一种软暴力。那么，什么是软暴力呢?与那种明确的主动性、进攻性和强制性的具有直接伤害的暴力不同，软暴力指的是人难以察觉而又支配和影响着人的某种隐性暴力。更具体地说，它是指某种以柔和的、劝诫的、安慰的、暗示的平静姿态出现的暴力形式，被称之为软暴力。它表现出各种各样的形态——或是与图像相关、或是与语言相关、或是与态度相关、或是与信息相关、或是与心理相关，或是与权力相关，等等。由于软暴力的特征常使人难以发觉，所以人也无法感受和体验其左右和控制的动机和形式。

　　正是基于这样的认识，高孝午开始了他新的雕塑创作，他的艺术观念已从那种依托于动漫的“快乐美学”解放出来，而是转向了具有严肃批判性的语言形态。这种转变是基于他对现实世界变化的洞察以及对人的心理反应的表现，即从自身的体验中去发现和感受当代人的精神境遇——人的隔膜、人的焦虑、人的困惑、人的痛苦，人的不安，等等。正如大家认为的那样，今天中国社会的物质极大丰富，科技也极大便捷，但我们普遍的幸福感远没有大于那种无处不在的焦虑感和压力感。那么，到底是什么原因造成了我们如此的缺乏幸福感呢?也许以西方为中心向外扩张的现代性是原因所在，它像脱缰的野马一样不断游离于世界各地，并混杂和建构着新的社会系统，当人们满怀热情去拥抱它时，它却会以不同的方式向人施以“暴虐”。尤在今天，与经典的消极暴力不同，当代的暴力在光天化日之下更是表现出了”积极”的表征，像媒体和病毒以透明的、公开的方式畅通无阻，不断的运行、外溢、扩散和转移。从这一视角出发，高孝午体验和发现了软暴力的日常存在。它似乎使人深陷难以挣脱的种种困扰，充斥于街头、电视、网络和杂志的广告、紧张的工作节奏、挤压的城市空间、拥堵的公共交通、承受压力的物价通胀、无处不在的信息控、沦为房奴的市民，等等，实际上，这些现象给人的精神和心理造成的是隐性的暴力，也就是艺术家所称之为的“软暴力”，因为人们似乎难以觉察和感受到它的存在，它甚至是无形的、非具体的，飘忽不定的东西。高孝午从语言和形式上提炼和凝缩了对软暴力的视觉再现，并一个侧面将表现对象置于具体的社会语境中，而使作品更具针对性和批判性。

　　艺术家高孝午正从这一视线出发，以他擅长的雕塑艺术表现了都市生活中与软暴力相关的文化征候。他将五件作品《染色体》、《样板》、《排泄物》、《软暴力》和《出入》组成了其个展的有机联系，而五件作品又从不同角度对软暴力进行了哲理性探讨。

　　在新创作的雕塑《染色体》中，高孝午以写实雕塑的方法刻画和表现了刚刚出生婴儿的可爱和天真状态。事实上，他并不是要着意强调婴儿的可爱形象本身，而是重心要表达关于生命诞生的权利。也就是说，婴儿诞生意味着被剥夺了否定性和抵抗的任何可能性。他的作品就蕴涵了对人类从生命存在的意义联想到生命的死亡本身的分析和表现。这就是鲍德里亚(Jean Baudrillard)所称之为的追求生理的快感和繁殖后代的需要。另一方面，高孝午把婴儿的活着比喻成体验各种软暴力的过程，是体验“软暴力”和对抗“软暴力”的过程。

　　与雕塑《染色体》相呼应，高孝午的作品《样板》更是直接介入现实性的问题——对都市人的生存空间和生活消费的反思。他以设计的方法切入豪华样板房的议题，把设计好的样板房置于巨大的黑色骷髅头中，而骷髅外形留有多个方形开口，而这些开口正是各个样板房的窗户，透过窗户，可以看到布置豪华的生活方式。显然，艺术家把样板看作是人的生存空间和消费理想的榜样。而这种样板就是充满诱惑和控制的软暴力，因为它是人为设计的消费“理想”和标准，消费者也就在无察觉中跟风而深陷其中。当然，黑色骷髅与样板房还具有另一层的象征意义——生命、时间、空间和死亡。面对这一切，人或者被剥夺，或者无法做主。这被艺术家主观地统摄于软暴力的视觉框架中。

　　值得注意的是，在这次个展中，高孝午创作了一件具有装置性的作品《排泄物》。它在感官上让人易于联想到工业的污染，而实际上是与人的身体相关的抽象理念。作品虽有省略身体的具体形态，但指涉的寓意却是与人的嘴及身体消化相关。《排泄物》在观念上则有更多隐喻性的表达，即人类的发展需要被消耗或消化，也需要好好排泄。正如艺术家所言，“在一定时候，拉比吃重要!”这事一种达达主义的语言表达方式。

　　可以说，高孝午在这次展览中最大作品和最重要作品是《软暴力》。他从自身的经验中发现，汽车的产生和发展给人类提供了便利和效率，使人类对之越来越依赖。但同时汽车又给人类的身体和心理带来了多重伤害，即污染、噪音、和拥挤。它让人产生既爱又恨的感觉。于是，艺术家以透视的方法和抽象化的语言，把无数汽车堆积成了肉感汽车，汽车变成了与人的身体器官或四肢一样的东西，充满流淌感和抽象线条感的形式，尤其在整个雕塑的底部塑造了一个被拍扁的挣扎的人。这种挤压感恰恰折射出今天都市中那种交通的拥挤不堪给人的心理和精神所造成的无奈、不安和狂躁感。众所周知，都市汽车的拥堵问题已是越来越严重的社会问题，不仅阻碍了社会经济的发展，而且给人的精神和心理产生了不同程度的焦虑、忧郁和创伤。这种现象不就是一种实实在在的软暴力吗!

　　在作品《出入》中，高孝午把孩提时代玩耍的陀螺巧妙置换成了富有运动感的螺丝钉雕塑，其上方是盘腿而坐的憨态佛，与那种螺尖插地的不稳定性构成了对比。显然，他把“出入”所指的出世和入世之意处理成了一种视觉化的语言，营造出了禅宗冥想的思想空间与不安的现实之间对立。艺术家的意图在于借用悟性减少那种带有诱惑性的软暴力对人的侵扰。该作品大有表现浮云之上的宁静之感，是一种超脱现实诱惑的安宁。

　　总而言之，高孝午把艺术在社会中的意义看作是“艺术应该具有一个提醒的功能，就像一个警示牌。”而他这次以“软暴力”为主题的个展生动地再现了人们对习以为常却不应被忽视的一些问题的思考，既让人能感受到一种直接的伤害的暴力，还能体验到一种悄无声息的影响人的生活的软暴力。艺术家用隐喻而抽象的艺术语言表达了对现实世界诸多问题的忧虑和批判，具体通过夸张而变形的雕塑语言加以主观发挥——汽车、房屋、儿童、消费、信息、信仰、欲望等组成的城市表象都被艺术家以“软暴力”视觉形式给予生动的表现和解析。

　　因此，艺术家高孝午的个展《软暴力》呈现出了全新的雕塑作品，生动地表现了独特而个性的视觉语言，既能让观众感到诙谐而幽默，又能使观众从中获得严肃的启示与反思。

　　“软暴力”是一个与人类息息相关的永恒主题。

　　Soft ViolenceNew Works by Gao Xiaowu

　　Unlike from the past works such as Standard Age, Our Generation, City Dream, and so on, Soft Violence is a new series of sculptures from the well-known young artist Gao Xiaowu. This is a new experiment since 2008, and there is a new direction in form and concept. Those works tend to show social criticism in their connotations, by diversification and installation in their form. Gao Xiaowu's artistic point of view has turn from the virtual physical state to thinking and analysis of society and culture. Those of which have concern the problems that are caused by the development of urbanization. Unfortunately, such things have often been ignored. He interprets visual images, language mode, media discourse and the psychological reactions as a soft violence. Thus, what is the soft violence? In the words of Gao Xiaowu, Soft violence would mean a hidden violence which is difficult to detect but dominate and affect upon people. More specifically, it refers to a form of violence appears with a soft, admonitory, comfort, suggesting and calm posture. It shows a variety of forms which could be related to the image, or language-related or associated with the attitude, or information-related, or associated with psychological, or associated with power, and so on. Eventually, people cannot feel and experience the motivation because it is simply difficult to find the characteristics of soft violence.

　　It is based on this understanding that Gao Xiaowu began his new sculpture project, while his artistic concept has been freed from the delight aesthetics which relies on the animation that turned into a language form of serious critique. This change is based on his insight into the changes of the real world and expression on the psychological reactions, i.e. to discover and to feel the contemporary spiritual state from his own experience - the human misunderstanding, anxiety, confusion, suffering, uneasiness, and etc. In this modern era, material wealth in China has become so abundant due to the advancement of science and technology which greatly improve our convenience in almost any aspect. However, our general feeling of happiness is no far greater than that ubiquitous sense of anxiety and stress. So what caused the lack of happiness? Perhaps the outward expansion of Western-centered modernity is the reason. It is diffusing around the world constantly, immingling and building a new social system, but when people embrace it with enthusiasm, it will execute tyrannical worst on people in different ways. In this age, contemporary violence is different from the vintage form of passive violence, as it is showing positive characteristics in daylight, going ahead in transparent and open ways like media and viruses, operating, overflowing, diffusing and transferring. From this perspective, Gao Xiaowu found and experienced daily existence of soft violence. It has seemed to absorb people into all kinds of troubles which difficult to get rid of. There are usually found in the streets, television, Internet and magazine advertising, intense work pace, squeezed urban space, congested public transport, inflation under pressures, the ubiquitous information control, and people who become house slaves. In fact, these phenomena reflect the idea that mental and psychological violence is hidden. Therefore, the artist perception of ‘soft violence’ is that people seem having difficulty to percept and feel its presence. Gao Xiaowu refined and condensed visual representation from language and forms, and portrayed his objects in a specific social context which made his works more relevant and critical.

　　Artist Gao Xiaowu is starting from this line of sight which expresses cultural signs that are related with soft violence in urban life. He forms an organic link of his solo exhibition with five works, Chromosome, Model, Waste, Soft Violence and Discrepancy. These five works express philosophic discussion of soft violence from different views.

　　In his recent works ‘Chromosome’, Gao Xiaowu depicts and expresses cute and innocent state of newly born baby by making realistic sculptures. In fact, he did not emphasize the baby's cute image itself deliberately, but to express the focus of the right concerned with the birth of life. For instance, the birth of the baby means it has been deprived of any possibility of negativity and resistance. Gao’s works have the implications analysis and expressions of death itself associated from general meaning of human existence. As quoted by Jean Baudrillard, “This is the pursuit of physical pleasure and reproduction needs.”On the other hand, Gao Xiaowu compares the baby’s living as a process of experiencing a variety of soft violence, a process of experiencing and fighting against soft violence.

　　Echoing with the sculpture Chromosome, Gao Xiaowu’s work, Model, is directly involving into real issues – reflections on living space and living consumption in city. With a approach of design, he takes the problem of luxury model houses, and put the designed model house into a huge skull, and there remains many square opening on the skull shape, every opening become a window of every model house, through which one can see the luxurious lifestyle inside. Obviously, artist takes the model as an example of living space and ideal consumption. However, this model is soft violence full of temptations and controls, because of it is artificially designed ideal and standard of consumption, and consumers plunge into it involuntarily. Of course, the black skull and model houses have another layer of symbolism - Life, Time, Space and Death. Confronted with all these, people are deprived of, or cannot call the shots. This is unifying into a visual framework of soft violence by artist subjectively.

　　In this solo exhibition, it is noteworthy that Gao Xiaowu has created an installation work called Waste. While it is easy to think of industrial pollution, which is in fact an abstract idea related with the human body, his work leaves out the physical state of body, but referential meanings are related to human mouth and digestion. In concept, Waste has more metaphorical expressions, that is, human development need to be consumed or digested, also need a good excretion. As the artist once said, “at some point, excretion is more important that eating!” It is a Dadaist way of language performance.

　　Some would say that Soft Violence is the largest and most important project in his entire exhibitions. From his own experience, he finds that production and development of automotive provides convenience and efficiency to people. People have become dependent on it even more but it also brings multiple physical and psychological harms to them such as pollution, noise, and traffic jam. It gives people a feeling of both love and hatred. Thus, the artist accumulates numerous cars into a sensual car with perspective approach and abstract language, and car becomes a thing that is similar to human body organs or limbs. This involves full of flowing and abstract lines. He also likes to shape a struggling figure which has been squashed. Such a sense of squeezing may reflect the psychological and spiritual helplessness, anxiety and mania caused by traffic jam in today's city. As we know, congestion problem in city is becoming increasingly a serious social problem, not only hindering the social and economic development, but also causing different levels of psychological anxiety, depression and trauma. Thus, is this phenomenon a real soft violence?

　　In Discrepancy, Gao Xiaowu replaces his childhood with a sculpture of a screw which depicts full of movement. On top, a cuddly-looked Buddha crosses his leg, formed a contrast with the instability of screw. Obviously, he disposes the meaning of coming in and out the world into a visualized language which creates a confrontation between thinking space of Zen meditation and disturbing reality. The artist intends to borrow a way of comprehension, in order to reduce the intrusion of tempting soft violence. This work has a sense of calmness above the clouds, and that is a peace transcend over the temptations in reality.

　　In short, Gao Xiaowu considers the significance of art in society as ‘art should have a function of reminder, like a warning card.’ His current exhibition with the theme of soft violence depicts vividly the thinking on some problems but should not be overlooked. This would make people feel that violence could be a direct harm to them, but at the same time, they will also experience a softer violence affecting their lives silently. Gao Xiaowu adopts metaphor and abstract artistic language, to express his concerns and criticism of many problems in the real world which exerts with exaggerated and abstract sculptural language – all urban appearances composed of car, house, baby, consumption, information, belief, desire, are expressed and resolved vividly with a visual form of soft violence.

　　Gao Xiaowu’s solo exhibition, Soft Violence, presents new sculptures, demonstrates vividly of a unique and personal visual language, while audience could feel its witty and humor, but at the same time, derive inspiration and serious reflection.

　　Therefore, Soft Violence is an eternal theme related closely with human being.

作者：黄,笃