Looking back even just for a moment, time has already changed. Without any discussion it has streamed away. If one looks back further, one might at some point be able to capture it.

There is no power that can stop changes, be they big or small. From the body’s hair or skin to the myriad objects in the universe, the word ‘change’ can connect all things together. Change has brought to mankind a new word – globalisation. Of course this word does not just belong to the mankind of today, but it is only used for today. In the verifiable past there existed also the reality of globalization, at the very least climatologically. So what really does this already rampantly used word bring? From what we know from different individual points in time, globalization is a word that can represent the evolution of civilization, and its essential quality is a new species of civilization. It uses its new energy and new style to continuously erode away the weaker species, or to stimulate its own internal change. If things continue in this way, this civilization is inevitably transformed, and a new civilization is built up, until this again is replaced, and so the cycle goes on. Of course what must be stated clearly is that this new species is not necessarily more excellent or more advanced, it is just merely new. To replace someone else only requires one to have a life force or a soil one can depend on, and that is sufficient. For all else it is up to the change itself to design. Therefore, from this perspective, globalization is a false concept, and merely a trend in change, or, it could be said, a dynamic noun, the significance of which is not great, and not really worth getting to know or investigating.

Of course this argument takes my art as a starting point from which to derive a logical conclusion, and it does not involve a detailed study of history, science or technology, so there is no need to do a long and seemingly correct elaboration.

Perhaps, in the entangled cracks in civilization, in the key points of certain times, the condition exhibited by change could be better observed. There is no need to go far back to the Renaissance that woke up mediaeval Europe, and neither is there the need to go back to the Revolution of 1911 that ended thousands of years of China’s imperial system. In the reality we face now, in the midst of the growth of the self, from city to village, from basic necessities to intellectual nourishment, from Twitter to WeChat, everywhere can be found both integrating and conflicting forces of civilization. The real life edition of Chinese society is the source of the evolution of new civilization of mankind. In every corner there is news of change.

 

In this environment, what kind of attitude will be shown by China’s visual arts? At the end of the 1970s, as China promoted is policy of reform and opening, once again there opened the channels to connect with world civilizations, and every level of society at its own pace and with differing rhythms began to seek to be in step with the world. A new cultural species called “contemporary art” began to exert its energies in Chinese society. The means of artistic expression became more and more varied, and there appeared new artistic media such as video, installation,  mixed media arts etc.

 

In the midst of all this, although painting remained most accepted in society and the mainstream of visual arts, change has already happened, most importantly in the word ‘image’. A few years ago in scholarly circles there was repeated argument about this concept, but reality is always unexpected, and before a suitable conclusion could be reached, change had again snuck in. In 2008 came the global economic crisis. Chinese society was not immune and indeed multiple problems became evident. However, by virtue of its size and its advantages in the reality of the recession, China became the world’s second largest economy, and quietly affected a change in the pattern of the world. Naturally this also changed the way that the world looked at China, and the art happening in China was also examined in the same light. Once again it began to organize its ideas, to reflect on its own cultural image and to explore its own paths towards a key point in time in a new civilization .

So is this question of ‘image’ an unsolvable enigma or is it the same as the previously mentioned ‘globalisation’ – essentially not a problem? Let us put aside this question for a while,  take a look at changes in other areas, and perhaps we can find some clues there.

 

Firstly should be considered the changes in the way mankind observes the outside world. Modern civilization is inseparable from the rapid development of science and technology - development that has included inventions which have improved mankind’s visual capabilities. These have expanded the ways in which mankind can look at the world, and have thus influenced the evolution of mankind’s art. It is common knowledge that painting is an expression of our perception of the real world, and that painting’s mission has historically been to demand restoration of lifelike images. This thirst for the truth has long spurred advancements in technology. New tools have emerged, and as an influence on modern painting, first and foremost amongst these has been photography, which has has changed the way mankind sees the world. Besides bringing immediate visual records of the world, photography has also been part of research in optics which has changed human visual civilization. From stills to moving images, from film to digital, its evolution has been continual. In the present day, the fact is that anyone with a cellphone has become an image producer.

 

Another change however stems from how images have transformed human life. Although we are used to viewing artworks in museums or galleries, in today’s lifestyle the place where we most often view artworks is on a screen. Be they three- or two-dimensional, all things are now rendered as images. As long as a cellphone is to hand, be it on the street or in the bedroom, we can receive images anywhere and at any time. This brings to mind the famous traditional Chinese painting “Along the River during the Qingming Festival” (simplified Chinese: 清明上河图; pinyin: Qīngmíng Shànghé Tú). With the help of digital technology, the painting can be magnified several times over, and on one’s computer it can be seen as if right up close. In fact details can be seen that are hard to make out with the naked eye - details that were beyond the reach of our ancestors. This has no doubt changed the perception of distance between people and objects, and also the temporal and spatial relations between us and our world.

 

From the above can be seen the cross influences of art and science and technology. Images are tools that each takes advantage of, and they also are nodes where the two meet. And it is around these nodes that my art hovers.

 

As if avoiding the problem of observation, from the start my work was not really in painting, but was a consideration of my own chosen topic through the viewpoint of a sort of Lone Ranger. The use of a union of eyes and flesh formed a mutant life form that could exist on the canvas, and that could be baptized as seeing and being seen. Over the following years I again took this eye that was my identity mark into images of reality. As an example, in the painting “In Heaven” the eye is a substitute for my own rising to the sky. It uses a perspective of close proximity to the clouds to appear in the human realm. There are other paintings that relate to memories of my youth and my pondering over existence. In these, the eye, my identity mark, appears in containers, in flowers, in icy water, and in images with cultural implications, time and time again, until it ceases with the start of another change.

 

The new changes result from movements on the tracks of my life. Some of the things I considered important in the past have become less so; and those things that in the past I regarded as not so important have changed to being rather weighty.  The net structure of thinking becomes like a filter, liquid material still flows through, but important solids are filtered out. These filtered out thoughts become the basis of the images in my new series of works. These include my learning – for example the painting “Hope”, where in the depth of the cloud of stars are the lights of the city I live in, and that figure with his back to us, comes from the form of the figure in Caspar David Friedrich’s painting “The Wanderer above the Mists”. This German painter was one of the artists I liked during my university studies. What appealed to me was not his skill at painting light and shadow, but was that his perspective was so different to that of others of that period. In my eyes he was a conceptual artist. But also they include my continued observation of our world. For example in the painting “Go Home”, the story of the passers-by in an unchanging station with its juxtaposition of human and material elements is impossible to fathom out. Included in these are secrets that I have preset and cannot reveal, as well as common customs from daily life. Back to reality, the arrangement and organizing of these images is my main work. These intersecting nodes of information are both nodes frozen in time and places where time disappears. Examining the remnants of those things that have seemingly disappeared but in fact are intangible has become the pleasure in my work. Everyone who works in art has his or her different method and rhythm. I use my own way and pace as reaffirmation of the tracks of my life.

 

Compared with the age of the Internet, painting is a traditional handicraft. Nothing that involves human dynamism can be cloned by handicraft – it will always lose its shape. The painter’s technique itself cannot be passed on. It will evolve, and adopt a new form in which it can survive. Just like the painting of today, which has almost no relation to tradition, it is a new species, and in each loss of shape the evolution of art presents new opportunities.

 

In the same way I did not have time to improve the coding of my thoughts, before the program upgrade automatically started. A new upgrade puts fresh demands on coding elements and modes of expression, and stretches the capability of the program itself. Examining a problem from a different angle is not to hide from the problem itself, but is to actively seek a way to solve it. Of course, leaving no stone unturned does not necessarily reveal the truth, but to make a change is at least to take a step nearer to it.

 

2016/2/12

 

翻译者 Tom Whitten

作者：朱海