寓言：

以卡通或观念的方法来理解俞洁的绘画，可能会无效。无论是新近，还是早些时候，俞洁的绘画都带有某种叙述性，被克制住的抒情，巧妙隐藏起来的冲突，让她画面停留在诗意和戏剧性之间那么一个未完成的瞬间里，这使得她的每幅作品后面都隐现一个事件。在她的绘画中，人没有个性，甚至没有性别，动物具有“人味”，它们之间有着平等、互换、交融的隐秘联系。因此画中的鹿角、兔头、兽皮，空气、树、星空以及惊异的眼睛成了启示式的符号。正是通过这些符号，俞洁将其日常经验转化成个人寓言。习惯当下艺术的人，凭经验会将其看成卡通式的欢愉，但她透露的冥想气质，使认真阅读其绘画的人，从中发现东方式的智慧和觉悟。

 

面容：

在很多艺术家那里，面孔表达个人或社会的愤怒、迷惘、禁锢、癫狂……就在前不久这种手段还是有效的，但转瞬间，以往有着政治和社会意味的形象已经被雾化，典型性已经无法把握，也就是说“容易”的形象正在消失。

在俞洁的作品里蒙着脸的人，她（他）用来表达的嘴、用来聆听的耳朵都被遮住，只剩下一双眼睛。事实上在一个急速变化的国度，所有的是否判断和经验判断常会使人蒙羞，而当代生活仿佛是一部全息影像，你存在看的可能，没有表达的权力。

这些形象去掉了表情，被遮住的不只是脸，而是对脸的社会性，俞洁因此让人的面容变得更干净，变得不再那么重要，从而也成了对脸部表情的意识形态的一种反驳。

在这里面具，就像帷蔓，后面永远停留着好奇，永远有另一种存在。面具也是禁忌、是界限，同时也是某种庇护。

博尔赫斯在谈论宗教时说：“人类失去了一个形象，一个无法重新见到的形象。”而让我们感到的是在 “易容”和“隐身”盛行的当代，人的面容已渐渐模糊。说到底，所有被记住的面容，都是面容之外的光芒，而非其本身。

 

仪式：

俞洁新近的绘画，放弃了前些年那些带有涂鸦意味式的即兴方式，更多了“写”的成份，作为一个强调东方性的艺术家，她是以温和的形式将现实性隐匿到形象后面。

她制造了很多看起来过于干净的画面，人物形象都有自足性，这些人和物都沉浸在自己的专注中，而不与看它的人（观众）对视，也就是说没有发现“被看”。那么它们在做什么呢？比如：有人在洗马――却是匹木马；有人在粒子里祈祷——是爆炸的粒子、有人俯视一颗――带有献祭意味的兔头等。细辨之下，我们发现，他们都是在干着非日常的事情，更像是一种姿态和表演。

如同在仪式中一样，在画面上制造的气场，也能让日常之物脱离了它的属性，上升到了形而上的高度，同样，作为一个习惯于沉寂的艺术家，通过绘画本身在内心获得“圣洁”，她（他）用画笔让自己稍稍飞离地面，飞离喧嚣的现实，在一定程度上画什么其实不重要，重要的是画画的姿态应该是清晰可辨的，重要的是空白（画布）后面的那个形象。

 

 

 

 

RITUAL

 

Fable:

To use cartoon or conceptual methods to understand Yu Jie’s painting might be ineffective. Her current and earlier paintings both have a narrative quality: the constrained expression of feelings and the hidden conflicts, which allow her painting to dwell in the incomplete moment between poetic sentiment and drama. Thus, each of her painting carries a looming event.

In her paintings there is no personality, not even gender.  The animals have “humanness”, with a secret sense of equality, exchange, and blending among each other.  Therefore the antler, rabbit head, animal skin, air, tress, star-lit sky, and surprised eyes all become heuristic symbols. It is through these symbols Yu Jie translates her day-to-day experience into a personal fable. Those who are familiar with the contemporary arts, based on their own experiences, might treat it as a cartoon-like joy, but her meditative quality reveals to the more observant viewers the Eastern wisdom and consciousness.

Faces:

 

For a lot of artists, faces express personal or social anger, such as confusion, imprisonment, and madness. Not long ago this way of expression was still valid, yet suddenly, the image that was previously politically and socially meaningful atomized. Its typicality becomes intangible.

 

In the works of Yu Jie, a masked face, the mouth and ears that she (or he) uses to speak and listen are covered, leaving only a pair of eyes. In a rapidly changing country, all judgments of right or wrong and judgments based on experience become embarrassment. Contemporary life is like a hologram, which, you only have the right to observe but not the power to judge.

 

For these images, what were covered were not merely the faces, but the sociality of the faces. Yu Jie makes the human face cleaner and no longer so important. Her art becomes a rebuttal of the ideology of facial expression.

 

Here the mask becomes a curtain, behind which are infinite curiosity and an alternative existence.  The mask is also a taboo, boundary, and a certain kind of asylum.

 

Jorge Luis Borges said, regarding to religion: “An image has been lost, and it can not be seen again.” In a contemporary time where “disguise” and “stealth” prevails, the human face has become gradually obscure. After all, all faces remembered are the light beyond the faces, rather than the faces themselves.

 

Ritual:

 

In her recent paintings, Yu Jie gave up the graffiti like impromptu style of previous years, and adapted more “writing” elements. As an artist who emphasizes oriental characteristics, she uses a moderated form to hide reality behind images.

 

She made a lot of paintings that are seemingly too clean. The characters are self-sufficiency. These people and objects are immersed in their own focus without looking at the viewers –they’ve not discovered that they are “being watched.” So what are they doing? To give a few examples: someone is washing a horse – but a wood horse; someone is praying in a particle – but an exploding particle; and someone looks upon a rabbit head – with a sense of sacrifice offered. When we observe carefully, we discover what they are doing is not daily routines, but more of a certain stance and performance.

 

Like in a ritual or ceremony, the energy field created on the canvas also allows a daily object to rise above its usual properties, to a metaphysical level In the same sense, as an artist accustomed to silence, through her paintbrush she flies slightly above the ground, above the noisy reality, and achieves “holiness” in her heart. To a certain extent, what to paint is not that important; what is important is that the stance is clear; what is important is the image behind the canvas.

作者：叶辉