我常常会想，我怎么会认识这个人或那个人?有的人可能因为工作关系;有的人可能因为生活需要;有的人可能仅仅是因为时间的原因。而我与杨千的认识则完全是因为命运的安排——1977年，全国开始恢复高考。那时我还在云南的晋宁县插队当知青。因为自小喜欢绘画，“强行认识”了昆明著名画家林聆先生，并“强行”拜他为师，学习上了画画。高考开始，原本很不自信的我，却意外地考上了四川美术学院油画系。而杨千当时在成都，据说是以高分的成绩轻松地考进了同一个学院的同一个系。就这样，我们便成了同班同学。更没想到的是，我们会成为朋友并一直到现在—一晃竟已整整二十八年!

　　记得第一次见到他是在学校的球场上。那天下午天气晴朗。我们班在那上体育课。我因为通知书发晚了两个星期，从云南匆匆赶到重庆，已开学两周了，班上的同学谁也不认识。那天下午是第一次见到除了我们寝室外的其他同学。杨千那时的名字叫杨谦。戴着一幅黑边的眼镜，留着一边倒的学生头，小白脸、不爱说话，有点忧郁的样子，像他的名字一样为人很谦和。我心里想，“这人长得有点小资。”我同寝室的秦明悄悄告诉我：“他就是西南考区的第一名—杨谦。据说他的素描画得特别‘腿’(即很棒的意思)，特别深入，而且往往是从眼睛的高光部位开始的。”哇，我听了后的惊讶可想而知。当然我还是有点半信半疑。

　　很快，在令我最痛苦的素描课上验证了秦明的这一说法。杨谦果然从石膏的眼睛高光开始一步一步非常准确地完成了整个一张素描!对这种极其不按教学步骤的方法进行作业，老师也一点办法也没有—因为每一张石膏素描(包括难度最大的大卫头像)，他都能非常精确地完成。真是要形有形、要调有调，从不出错。几年下来，杨谦始终是班上的高分获得者。

　　我是当时班上换寝室换得最多的一个人。先是与罗中立等同住，后又与周春芽，再后还与七八级的叶永青等人同居，最后一年转到了与杨谦头顶着头地同住一个寝室。那年代大家都喜欢比谁更勤奋，更能读书读到最晚。我们俩因为是头顶头的床铺，因此当熄灯后也就自然用同一根蜡烛。但我发现常常还是熬不过他，大多数时间是由他控制吹熄蜡烛的权利。同时杨谦也是班上几个为数不多的古典音乐发烧友之一。画画的时候，一个是他，一个是何多苓，都会情不自禁地吹着某一位古典大师的某一段音乐旋律的口哨。当然也常常会遭到某一位严厉的教师地强行禁止。他和何多苓很高的音乐素养是公认的。甚至何多苓会说自己的音乐史知识比美术史知识还好。说实话，我有时会怀疑杨谦是否考错专业了?因为在绘画上他不属于那种要做“前卫艺术家”的人。虽然后来他也喜欢尝试各种方式进行创作，但我总觉得他的骨子里仍然是一个“浪漫主义的小资”。在他的成名作到后来的乡土系列中，都能感受到这一点。但是就是这样的人最终还是没能逃脱“美帝国主义”的洗礼，所以才有了后来的“杨千”这个人。

　　1984年，杨谦终于等到了美国的签证。赴美之前，他特意来了一趟云南看我，并去了一次我和大毛、叶帅常去的圭山，画了一堆后印象风格的风景，还选了两张送给我。我一直保存至今，可惜有一张在我在重庆教书的岁月中被老鼠吃掉了。从大学毕业后，尤其是他去了美国，由于身处两地，我们开始了漫长的通信之途。通过他，我一点点地开始知道了美国。就在他为生存奔波拼搏的同时，还时不时的没忘了要给我寄上一些美国的画册，其中有一本就是我所特别敬仰的美国抽象主义大师罗斯科。这些书曾经陪伴我渡过了在重庆的那段漫长而又阴暗的岁月。而他的每一封来信我总是读了一遍又一遍，竭力在那些细小的字里行间中去揣摩和想象我们梦中的”伟大美利坚”究竟是怎样的?记得有一封来信中，杨谦曾画过一幅漫画，画上是我们两个人同时在看月亮，我在说：“谦儿，你看月亮好圆喔……”他则在说：“是不是喔?……”月亮上写着“美国”两个字。

　　杨谦也常常将他的新画照片寄给我：画得有迷茫的女人体，也有把两张不同的世界名画并置在一起的，与他在国内的风格完全彻底改变了。同时他也用垃圾做一些小型装置，还用一种比较诡异的办法拍摄一些人物的肖像或女人体。在美国做的这些作品中，他的“浪漫主义小资”似乎隐藏起来了，取而代之地是一种观念性和技术性相结合的”理性作品”.或许是美帝国主义实在是太强大了，以至于把我们的浪漫主义谦儿活生生地给逼成了一个迷茫而又虚幻的“愤青”了 ?

　　我特别羡慕杨谦的有三点：第一，“失忆能力”很强。了解他的人都知道，杨谦属于那种心很宽的人，表面温柔谦和的他，实际上在个人生活的道路上经历了很多的波折。但他总是能很快地把那些换个人会痛苦一、二年的事给消解掉，顶多嘴上哼一句：“锤一子!”在美国的十八年闯荡中，他经历过从穷学生到一个能卖画的职业画家。曾经有房有车 ，也收一些古董，可称之为中产阶级的生活了，到后来由于一些其他原因再次跌入低谷，最后怀揣着两万美元重回祖国…… 如此折腾，换了我估计要得忧郁症了。也许正是他的这种健康积极的心态，成就了他能始终如一的面对一次次的波折而重新开始，对待今天复杂多变的艺术和生活而保持着一个“新人”的姿态。如今看来,这种“失忆的能力”使得杨谦在生活场景的多重变幻中(成都—重庆—纽约—北京)围绕着自己的艺术理想而幸存了 下来;另一方面，也使他跳出了传统艺术家的对风格主义的过分迷恋。

　　第二，“现实主义”的态度。记得1996年我第一次去纽约，杨谦来机场接我们，一起吃了晚饭，当走进地铁时，杨谦对每一个朋友都反复地交待：身上要带20美元，以免被打劫时丢了命，别站得离铁道太近，以免被黑人从后面揣上一脚等等。第二天，他领着我们开始参观苏荷的画廊区，听着他非常娴熟地介绍某某画廊的背景，某某艺术家的发展情况。我们都十分敬佩他对纽约当代艺术的了解。想到很多国人来到美国后开始放弃艺术，或者回到中国传统，似乎开始理解他在美国的绘画风格，以及他的流利的英语。他属于那些为数不多的试图将自己全部融入到美国的当代艺术氛围里的人(除了顽强的四川饮食习惯外)。凭着这种“现实主义“的态度，促使他能在最陌生的环境中顽强地学习，顽强地生活，顽强地探索，孤独地创作。这也是为何他能在回到北京后，在面对重新变得陌生的艺术环境中，仅用了很短的时间调整自己，迅速进入到中国的当代艺术队伍中，成为一个令人钦羡的艺术家。

　　第三，思维的灵活性。我常常觉得，杨谦(对了，现在已是杨千了)不是一个“很老实”的艺术家。从大学时代起，他就可以从一种风格迅速跳到另外一种风格。他在乡土时期，一边可以画具有细密风格的风俗画，同时也可以画出野兽派风格的作品。到了美国，似乎有了更充分的理由去用各种材料表达他不同的感受。回到北京，成为了如今的杨千，一个新人，他同样有足够的理由开始在图片、小型装置和绘画中来回自由地游荡，直到最近的“活动绘画”。2002年,杨谦离开美国回到北京,在花家地西里租了一间小画室,每天埋头苦干，差不多隔一两天我就会听他谈起自己完全不同的艺术想法。直到我看到他的“浴室”作品后，很不礼貌地“强行建议”他就这样画下去吧，免得被他弄晕掉了。当然，迄今为止，他的“浴室”作品是我最喜欢的。包括发展到后来的水珠和大脸。我总觉得这批作品中使我看到了一个我所熟悉的杨谦—忧郁的、敏感的、带点“风流”的(浪漫的)、静默中含着灰色的诗意、流动的暧昧、迷茫之中却又蕴涵着古典的情怀，在聪颖、多情善感的下面是一颗渴望超越的心灵。

　　如今的杨千，已成为了一只令很多人羡慕的神奇“海龟”—拿着美帝国主义的护照，回国讨了美丽贤惠的新娘，在艺术的征途中茁壮成长，超大的画室，涌涌不断的艺术构想及大把的美金……一切似乎都在向着大多数人的梦想的王国靠近，再靠近。时代的变化太快了，生活的变化太快了，我们徘徊在失忆与记忆的矛盾状态中，刚刚准备痛苦的时候，却又被许多意外的惊喜打断了。从杨谦到杨千，我真切地感受到我们这一代人所被迫承受的时代变迁。也许我们应该感谢这个多变的时代，它使我们在有限的时间之中却经历了多重生活的刺激和快感?也许我们应该庆幸自己的命运，它引领着我们不断地向前奔跑，以至于无法顾及身边地闲花野草，甚至没有时间去重新翻开我们那些已经陈旧的日记?也许我们应该学会去理解这个变得日趋冷酷的生活，至少它使我们从中恢复了早已变异的“狼性”? 在我们被迫接受种种多变而又单调的生存环境之时,我们的记忆只会使人陷入无益的忧郁与惶恐之中—这个古老而又永远纠缠着人类不放的病种?

　　再过一月，杨千在国内的首次个展就要开幕了，我真诚地祝福我的老同学老朋友，在这条充满变数地道路上，一路走好。

　　2006•11•13

　　Sometimes I wonder how I have got to know a certain person. I have got to know some people for reasons related to work, or everyday life, or simply thanks to the passage of time. It was completely a matter of fate that I got to know Yang Qian. In 1977, the college examination was reassumed nation-wide. I was a member of the “intellectual youth” (educated young people of that time) sent to work in Jinning County in Yunnan Province. I was interested in painting since I was small, so I “imposed myself on” Mr. Lin Ling, a famous painter in Kunming and “forced him” to take me in as a student. That’s how I began to study painting. In the college entry examination, despite my lack of confidence, I got accepted by chance into the painting department of the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts. Yang Qian was in Chengdu at that time. It was said that he easily got into the same department of the same academy as me with a very high score. That’s how we became classmates. What I never thought about at that time was that we would remain friends until today – It’s been 28 years in a flash!

　　I remember the first time when I met him was in the school playground. It was a bright afternoon. It was a sports class. Because my acceptance letter was sent two weeks late, I had to rush to Chongqing from Yunnan and by the time I arrived at school, the school had started two weeks ago. I didn’t know any person in that class. It was the first time in that afternoon that I got to meet the other classmates outside of my dormitory. Yang Qian was called Yang Qian (Qian was another character) at that time. He was wearing a pair of black-framed glasses, a student’s hairdo with a hair bang on one side of the forehead, had a fair complexion. He didn’t talk much and seemed a bit melancholic. As his name of that time suggested, he was very modest and easygoing. I thought to myself, “this guy looked a bit like a petty bourgeois.” Qin Ming, who was in the same dormitory as me, confided to me, “he scored the highest in the test among students from the southwestern region. It was said that his sketch was particularly good, especially in-depth and he always started his painting from the part of reflecting light at the eyes.” Wow, you can imagine how amazed I was after hearing all of this. Of course, I was not completely convinced.

　　Soon enough, Qin Ming’s description of Yang Qian was confirmed in the sketch class, which I found the most painful class. Yang Qian did start from the reflecting light of the eyes and accurately completed an entire sketch step by step. He didn’t strictly follow each step of the procedure taught by the teacher, but the teacher couldn’t do anything about it, because he could make sketches of each plaster statue (including the most difficult head portrait of David) with precision, with excellence in form and tone. He never made any mistake. In a few years of time, Yang Qian always scored the highest in our class.

　　I changed to a different dormitory the most frequently in our class. I had shared the same room with Luo Zhongli at first, then Zhou Chunya, then Ye Yongqing and other students of Class of ‘78. The last year, I switched to the same dormitory with Yang Qian. Our beds were placed head to tail with each other. In that era, everyone liked to be the most hardworking of all and tried to compete with each other as to how late they could stay up reading. Since our beds were linked with each other, Yang Qian and I shared the same candle after the light was switched off. I realized that I usually fell tired and asleep earlier than him. Most of the time, he was the one who had the right to blow off the candle. Meanwhile, Yang Qian was one of the few fans of classical music in our class. While painting, he and He Duoling would begin to whistle some classical music masters’ tunes without knowing it. They were often ordered to stop by a stern teacher. Yang Qian and He Duoling’s musical talents were widely recognized to the point that He Duoling would sometimes admit that his knowledge of music history was better than that of art history. To be honest, I had at times suspected whether Yang Qian had got into a wrong field. Actually in terms of painting, he didn’t belong to the kind of people who wanted to be an “avant-garde” artist. Although later on he took an interest in experimenting with different kinds of practice, I felt that deep down he was still a “romantic petty bourgeois.” I could sense such a personality in the pastoral series that he created after he became famous. But even such a person eventually couldn’t escape the test of “American imperialism.” That’s how later on another Yang Qian emerged.

　　In 1984, Yang Qian finally received his visa to America. Before he left for America, he came to Yunnan to see me especially and visited Guishan, where Damao, Yeshuai and I always hung out. He painted a bunch of post-impressionist landscape paintings and picked out two of them for me as a present. I have kept them until today. When I was teaching in Chongqing, one of them was eaten by the rats. After graduation, especially because he went to America and we were in two different places, we embarked on an extended passage of correspondences. Through him, I got to learn about America bit by bit. While he was struggling for a living in the States, he never forgot to occasionally send me some catalogues published in America. One of them was about Mark Rothko, the American abstract painting master who I particularly admired. Those books accompanied me all through the lengthy yet gloomy years in Chongqing. I always read each of his letters over and over again, trying to make up and imagine the “great America” that we all dreamed of between the lines of those tiny words. I remember in one of the letters, Yang Qian drew a cartoon, on which both of us were looking at the moon at the same time. In the cartoon, I was saying, “Qian’r, look, the moon is so round…” while he was saying “is it really?…” There written on the moon were the two characters for “America.”

　　Yang Qian often sent me pictures of his new paintings too. He painted hazy portraits of naked females, or juxtaposed images of two different world famous paintings. His style changed completely from his former style in China. At the same time, he made some small-scale installations out of garbage, or photographed some portraits of female bodies with a rather secretive method. In the works that he made in America, his nature as a “romantic petty bourgeois” seemed to be concealed? Instead, they were a kind of “rational work” that combined the conceptual and the technical. Or perhaps the American imperialism seemed to be so powerful that it forced our romantic Qian’r into a confused yet illusive “angry youth”?

　　There are three things about Yang Qian that I particularly admired. First of all, he is inclined to “forget.” Those who know Yang Qian well know that Yang Qian belongs to the type of person with a generous heart. Despite his gentle and unpretentious appearance, he has actually undergone a lot of ups and downs in his life. But he has always been able to quickly overcome events that would have pained another person for one to two years. At the most he would just let out, “Chui…zi!”(A cursing word in Sichuanese dialect) During his 18 years of adventure in the States, he went through the transformation from a poor student to a professional painter who could live on selling his work. He once had his house and his car, and collected a number of antiques, which could be considered a “middle class” life style. For some reasons, he subsequently experienced the darkness of his life, until he returned to China, with only 20,000 US dollars in his pocket. Such a dramatic shift in life would have rendered me sick with depression. It’s perhaps because of his healthy and positive attitude that he has been able to start afresh after so many twists and turns and to embrace the complicated and fast changing art world and life with the attitude of a “newcomer.” When we look at it today, Yang Qian has been able to survive the many changes in his life (from Chengdu to Chongqing to New York to Beijing) thanks to his knack for “loss of memory.” On the other hand, it has also enabled him to be free of the over indulgence of traditional artists in certain styles.

　　Secondly, he has a “realistic” attitude. I recall when I went to New York for the first time in 1996, Yang Qian came to pick us up at the airport. We had dinner together and as we were walking into the subway, Yang Qian warned each of us over and over again. He told us that we should each carry 20 US dollars with us so that we wouldn’t lose our life if we were robbed. Don’t stand too close to the railway, Yang Qian said, in case some guy would give us a kick from the back and so on. On the second day, Yang Qian took us to visit the galleries in SOHO. He gave us a very detailed introduction to the backgrounds of some of the galleries and the careers of some artists. We were all very impressed with how much he knew about contemporary art in New York. When I thought about the fact that many Chinese after landing in America, stopped practicing art, or returned to Chinese tradition, I seemed to begin to understand his style of painting in America and his fluent English. He belonged to the few of those who tried to be engaged entirely into the contemporary art world in America (while he managed to stay faithful to his inherent taste for Sichuan cooking.) Thanks to this kind of “realistic” attitude, he could carry on studying tenaciously, living positively, constantly exploring and working alone. That is precisely why after he returned to Beijing, he could quickly confront an art environment that was once again unfamiliar to him and adjust himself within a very short time to be involved in the local art scene and become a highly admirable artist.

　　Thirdly, his intellectual flexibility. In my mind, Yang Qian (yes, it’s a different Yang Qian now) is not a “very well-behaved” artist. While in university, he was already able to switch from one style quickly to another. During the period when he was working on pastoral themes, he could make folk art paintings in an intricate fashion while painting fauvist works. In America, he seemed to have found more sufficient reasons to express his feelings with different kinds of materials. After he returned to Beijing, he adopted a different Chinese character in his name and became a new person. Thus he has equally convincing reasons to begin experimenting freely among photographs, small-scale installations and paintings, all the way to his recent “kinetic paintings.” In 2002, Yang Qian left America and moved back to Beijing. He rented a small studio in Huajiadi Xili and was working nonstop every day. Almost every other day, I would listen to him talk about a completely different idea for his art practice. Until I saw his “bathroom” works, I impolitely “forcefully suggested” that he continue painting them so that he wouldn’t risk being confused by himself. Naturally until today, his “bathroom” paintings are my favorite, including those that were painted at a later stage with water drops and big faces. I still feel that these works reveal to me a Yang Qian that I have been familiar with – melancholic, sensitive, a bit “flirtatious,” (romantic). The solemnity and quietness in his work have a gray and poetic feel and a kind of fluid ambiguity. There is a love for the classic in his confusion. There is a heart that longs for transcendence underneath his intelligence and sensitivity.

　　Today’s Yang Qian has become an “overseas returnee” that many people envy. He has an American passport, married a beautiful and virtuous wife and his art career has taken off steadily. He has moved into a super size studio. He is full of great ideas for art and has earned a lot of US bills…His life seems to be moving closer and closer to the kingdom that most people dream of, and closer. Changes take place too fast in our time. Our life changes too rapidly. We linger in the state of conflict between amnesia and memory. As we are ready to embrace pains, our trend of thought is then disrupted by many pleasant surprises. From Yang Qian to Yang Qian, I can clearly sense the transformations of our times that were forced upon our generation. Maybe we should be grateful to this era of many changes. It has enabled us to experience the excitement and pleasant sensation of a multifold life in a limited time frame. Maybe we should rejoice in our fate. It leads us to constantly move ahead so much that we have no way to pay attention to the inconsequential details of our life, or have no time even to reopen those outdated dairies of ours. Maybe we should learn to understand this life that is becoming crueler, at least it allows us to repossess the “wild nature” that has already degenerated. As we are forced to accept a shifting yet monotonous living environment, our memory can only drive people into worthless misery and terror, an ancient disease that forever infects the human being.

　　In another month, Yang Qian’s first solo exhibition in China will be opened. I send my old schoolmate and old friend my best wishes for a fruitful career in a world that is full of unexpected changes.

　　The first draft was completed in Wang Jing at 1.38am on November 11, 2006.

　　The second draft was completed in Hongkou in Shanghai at 2.15pm on November 13, 2006.

作者：张晓刚