认识瞿倩梅的画比认识其人要早，那是在一次国际双年展上。后来她阔别旅居了26年的巴黎。带着对艺术的梦想与执着回到了北京创作。她是一个敏感﹑知性而赋有才华且懂得生活的女人，更是一个率直﹑勤奋﹑奇特而赋有创新的艺术家。曾多次去她北京的工作室，每每见到她的作品便觉得羞愧难当，因为她干了一件“很男人”的事儿。

　　但凡到过瞿倩梅工作室的人,无不惊诧于，作为一个女艺术家工作量之庞大,作品之大气,甚至是霸道。这也是我作为一个虔诚的艺术追求者而感到羞愧的原因.她近期创作的《藏之魂-境•遇》系列，大多采用高温煅烧的高岭土作为主要材料.作品浑厚而充满张力,黑色的应用赋予画面以沉稳与神秘.作品的尺幅都很大，画框四周又都用很厚的槽钢为外框，每件作品单重量都在几百公斤以上。这批作品，无论从内在的品质上，数量上，还是视觉效果上，在今天艺术界的众多抽象作品中都是佼佼者和无法回避的话题。

　　在这样一个“艺术品”泛滥而“艺术”匮乏的时代。到处都是丧失信仰，缺乏价值，对资本谄媚的平庸之作。然而，瞿倩梅的作品却带给了我们些许的安慰。那么，如今的艺术界如果说有危机感的话,那么最大的危机就是在艺术泛滥的洪流中，缺乏最潜在的动力¬-----思想力和真诚。当人们在全力倾注的这份艺术事业时,很少带着真诚去思考它的过去，现在和未来。很少寻找其内在的流程，也很少以历史观念与时代的审美追求之间主动地，以进击者的姿态给自己定位。并进而给我们这个时代的艺术定位。人们浑浑噩噩地只知盲目勤奋的“创作”是不行的，那样只会成了画匠，而成不了艺术家。从这一点上，可以毫不客气的说:瞿倩梅是真正的艺术家。她为虔诚的艺术追求者树立了榜样。中国需要这样的艺术家!

　　瞿倩梅不仅具有深邃的思想力，还带有对人类，对历史，对自然和艺术的无比虔诚与真诚。她放弃了法国优越的生活条件和人文环境，放弃了和家人女儿团聚的深情，独自回国追寻她的艺术梦想与内心之旅。其实，这是她人生历程中，一次对自己内心的朝圣与回归。真诚以臻化境， 无态而具众美，她的创作为她诠释了这一切。她的作品显露了旺盛的表现力，史诗般的绘述而又不失朴实，在原创性中没有任何取巧，在坦率的造型中透露出自己的个人特色，作品传达了一种生动的真诚感性和内心对外界事物的凝练思考。对于创作，她始终在追求“整体的完美”，因为整体是大感觉是大感情，况且整体本身也包含着无数个局部的完美。她的创作不仅仅表明了她地域上的回归,西方到东方，法国到中国;也是精神上的一种回归,漂泊到沉淀，束缚到自由;更是绘画本身的一种回归,具象到抽象,观念到纯粹的情感表达。这种回归是人生的一种境界，瞿倩梅用她的艺术创作把这种回归的境界呈现出来。她的这种“呈现”或者说创作是建立在，她对绘画发展规律的历时性和时代性，所呈现诸多艺术思潮横向特征互相撞击后的理性把握上;建立在中西文化互相排挤又互相融合的背景之上;建立在对整个人类优秀传统文化深刻认识和理解之上，所以她对作品所呈现出大文化内涵的丰富性和强烈的艺术个性一旦有机的结合，便毫不犹豫的走上了当代艺术创造的一个令人瞩目的台阶。

　　这个台阶同时提高了艺术家本人的精神视野。然而，艺术家的精神视野，以及本人个性的成长和发展，是与她的艺术密切相关的，无论是生活中还是艺术上，瞿倩梅始终都是真诚的，同时又是智慧的。她在释放她的潜在能量----关于艺术感受和思考积贮。她的作品是情感被隐匿于黑暗中的最高的抽象形式。正如画家本人所说“《藏之魂》系列就此启动。多少年的生活积淀，多少年的心驰神往，化作创作的激情和汗水，交融在高原的红土里，交融在梦中的画面里，一发不可收……”

　　她并不太愿意将自己的追求，过多置于当代艺术活动之中，那与她的思维和艺术实践有些距离，她走的更远一些，功利性更少一些。她只是按自己的意愿进行创作，而不听命于任何人。她只信任自己的感觉和深刻的理性思维，从艺术家本身角度看，她显得更为真纯，也更为自我。当然，也显得更加潇洒。坦言的说，这也只是她生命历程中的一段“短暂的回归与境界”，前面的艺术路还很长，任重而道远。希望她走的再坚实、再沉凝、再纯化。

　　如果说必须有“艺术观”的话，在我看来就是一个艺术家必须通过自己的真正创造，证明优秀的艺术今天依然存在着，并且证明，仍然有充足的理由继续存在下去。瞿倩梅以他(她)的艺术实践证明着(了)，她使我们抽象艺术发展和生命更有信心。我想：尽管天意难问，但艺术不会愧对每一位虔诚的朝圣者。

　　                                                李垒

　　                                                2010年9月于北京

　　“Chew” Thoughts on Series of Sprits of Tibet—Circumstances/ Experiences

　　My recognition of Qu Qianmei’s paintings is earlier than my acquaintance with her. That was on an international biennale. Afterwards she left Paris where she has resided for 26 years and returned to Beijing with her dreams and dedication for art. She is such a sensitive, intellectual and talented woman who knows how to live, what’s more she is also a straightforward, diligent and unique artist endowed with innovation. Having been to her studio for many times, I felt ashamed every time I saw her paintings since she has done something quite manlike.

　　Everyone who has been to Qu’s studio couldn’t help feeling surprised at her huge workload and her tremendous even overbearing creations. That’s why I feel ashamed of myself as being a devout pursuer of art. Her recently invented series of Sprits of Tibet—Circumstances/ Experiences mostly adopt high-temperature calcined kaolin as the main material. These works are vigorous and full of tension as well as the application of black endows them with calm and mysterious flavor. They are quite big in size while very thick channels are made for their frame, thus each piece of work is above hundreds of kilograms in weight. Whether from internal quality, quantity or from visual effects, they would be among the hall of fame in today’s abstract works and become an unavoidable topic among the circle of art.

　　In such an age that so called “artworks” overflow while “art” is deficient but faithless unvalued mediocre works which flatter captain are everywhere. However, Qu Qianmei works have brought us some comfort. Therefore, if there is a sense of crisis in today’s art world, the biggest crisis lies in the lack of the most potential power—force of thought and sincerity among the proliferation of art. When people are fully devoted themselves to art, they seldom sincerely think about its past, present and future. They rarely look for its internal process or initiatively advance to orient themselves with the art of this age between historical conceptions and aesthetic pursuit of the times. People who blind themselves with ambitious “creation” could not be enough since they make themselves painters but not artists. For that matter, Qu Qianmei is unquestionably a genuine artist. She sets an example for pious art pursuers. China needs such kind of artists!

　　Qu Qianmei has not only profound thoughts but also incomparable devotion and sincerity for human beings, history, nature and art. She gave up her comfortable living conditions and literate environment in France, she also dropped affectionate reunion with family to return alone for the quest of her artistic dreams and inner journey. Actually, this is a pilgrimage and return to her heart during her life course. Her creations interpret her style that her sincere transformation aims to attain and her depictions in no state possess all the beauty. They reveal a strong expression in epic depiction with simplicity. There are no tricks in her originality but her personal characteristics through candid style. They convey a kind of vivid emotional sincerity and inner concise thinking of external things. As for creation, she always pursues “the whole perfection” since the overall is a great feeling and it contains numerous partial perfections. Her works do not only mean her geographical return from West to East, from France to China but also a kind of spiritual recurrence from drifting to setting, from bound to free; moreover it is a return to painting itself, from the concrete to the abstract, from the concept to the purely emotional expression. This kind of return is a realm of life and Qu Qianmei represents it with her artistic creations. Her “presentation” or creation is based on her rational understanding of diachronism and temporal spirit in the developing laws of paintings as well as conflicted features of numerous emerging artistic trends of thought; it is also based on the background of mutual exclusion and fusion between Chinese and Western cultures as well as her deep comprehension of entire excellent traditions and cultures of human beings. Consequently, she organically combines her great cultural richness of content with her strong artistic characteristics to step with no hesitation into a remarkable level of contemporary art creation.

　　This also increases the artist’s own spiritual vision. However, her spiritual vision and her personal growth are closely related to her art, whether in life or art, Qu Qianmei always remains sincere and intelligent. She is releasing her potential energy—her artistic feelings and storage of thoughts. Her works are the most abstract form of emotions hidden in the dark. As the artist herself said, “Spirits of Tibet starts here. Accumulation and fascination of many years has turned into creative passion and hard work, and blended into the red clay on the plateau, integrated into images in my dreams, broken in its all fury…”

　　She is not willing to put too much of her own pursuits into contemporary art activities which have some distance with her thinking and artistic practices. She would rather walk farther with fewer utilitarian. She creates according to her own will rather than taking orders from others. Only trusting her own feelings and profound rational thinking, she seems more pure and self from the perspective of artist. Certainly, she seems more stylish. Frankly speaking, this might be only a section of her life course which is “a brief return and realm” and there is still a long way to go on the path of art. We do hope she would walk more stably, more steadily and more purely.

　　If there must be some “artistic conception”, for me it is that an artist should prove excellent art still exists and has its ample reasons to continue through his or her genuine creation. Qu Qianmei makes us more confident in the development of abstract art and life through her artistic practices. I think even though God has his will, art will never make its every pious pilgrim unworthy.

　　                                               Li Lei

　　                                              2010 September in Beijing

作者：李垒