染纸

一纸一课​​

王楠​​

    三万多年前，从在岩壁上绘出第一枚图像开始，人类便再也没有理由去克制绘画的冲动。直到纸本出现，古老的书写经验才在真正意义上被打破：图像与文字不再只停留在静止的墙壁上，绘画与符号也不仅存于沉重的器皿中，在自由轻逸的纸上，我们赖以生存的世界和万物被唤醒，纸取代了艺术最原始的载体，开启了与万物自由隐谧的对话。千百年来，在艺术形态领域，这个古老的材质在历经高度文明与时间洗练之后，愈发演变成一种包容的集合体：水墨、水彩、素描、创作手稿……无论是作为任何艺术创作形式的最终呈现，或是作为艺术家精神世界创作凝聚的预示，纸本都作为最广泛意义之上的承载物被采纳。艺术史学家诺曼 · 布莱森（Norman Brysona）认为，“纸本的白色背景就像一个存储器，图像可以从其中浮现出来。这个空白的空间在感知上是存在的，而在概念上是不存在的。”绘画的意义就在于令独有的线条与色彩赋予这个空白背景一个属于绘画本身的身份。​

       在纸上，奇迹从未消失。今天所有在纸上进行的绘画，都借助纸本的简单与纯粹，凸显每一寸笔触散发出的透明与真诚，就如同素描的线条，永远都存在于变成自己的过程中，永远都在描述自己是什么，却始终不给出答案；也如同水彩的轮廓，是线与色的相互博弈与彼此妥协，令纸的肌理、色彩的张扬与水的一丝丝渗透演绎成一场完美的互动，就像本雅明所说，“色彩与线条唯一达成一致的领域就是水彩，其中铅笔的轮廓是可见的，颜料也是透明的。在水彩中，背景也被保留下来，虽然它被赋予了颜色。”纸本有意也无意的泄露著艺术家在面对作品与材料的拿捏中，心灵所承受的挣扎轨迹，所有的努力与擦拭都无从逃脱。纸犹如一片自由无垠的荒野，所有汁水、彩色、气息都在此肆意奔腾混浊交错，这些元素在纸上的偶发汇聚仿佛得以还原艺术家真实的创作过程，似乎可以捕捉到那一刻突如其来的灵感闪光，这些是我们在具有遮蔽性与完整性的油画、雕塑、装置作品之中无法体会的。

    今天我们所关注的当代艺术创作，更多是建立在对传统绘画认知的颠覆与报废之上，所谓创新的艺术形式都是站在绘画之外对艺术进行外在形态的实验和改变，涂鸦艺术、大地艺术、观念艺术，及许多非传统形态的表现方式都在跳出绘画的范畴去寻求创作的多种立体形式的突破，它们采用新的媒介手段并且依赖高科技，试图通过设计的逻辑理念来消解绘画最本质的内核。在什么都可以成为艺术的今天，我们更加需要把目光重新追溯到一张纸上。是艺术家把捕捉的每一个灵感的形状都交给面前的纸张；每一张纸上、每一天、每一次的开始与结束，都在丈量艺术家生命的宽度，在每个记录的过程中，或许都是一次修行。只有真正关注个体创作的过程与状态，才能挖掘出艺术家内在深处的力量。

    展览《染纸》汇集了二十余位70及80后艺术家，他们有的在经历过多种形式的实践创新之后再一次回归到最初始的状态。作品中的线条与色彩作为一种绘画态度的彰显在今天显得尤为珍贵。他们代表著一种辗转于自我话语空间的营造，他们或许心无旁骛的专注于一棵植物的千丝万缕，亦或对西方绘画形式在保持审慎态度的同时，保存著个人记忆经验独特的图像输出。他们在纸上的绘画犹如一系列灵感的碎片，拼凑著艺术家从构思、搜集素材、灵感来源及不断修正的全部过程，令观者想要迫不及待去还原画面背后那份最真实的力量与驱动。在作品的呈现上，我们打破传统的墙面悬挂的形式，根据每位艺术家的感觉来选择灵动的展示方法，让灵活的纸张与观者产生精神的对话。他们的绘画，在这一刻，回到原点，并用纯粹赋予我们的视觉以语言的力量，不断的提示我们，回到绘画本身，回到艺术家本身。这是艺术在纸上带给观者的另一种方式的自由。

    艺术家，是艺术最永恒的引擎。如果，此次推出的展览《染纸》能够作为当下青年艺术家们纸上作品的一个微观切片，去呈现他们今天最真实的创作状态，同时诠释今天纸本作品多元化形式的结构，这或许就是展览的意义所在。我们希望在展示空间中捕捉到作品灵感的形状，让它们漂浮在空中，回荡在耳畔，最终可以跌落在每位观看者的心里。我更希望这个展览能够成为艺术家们自由灵感的一次安静书写。倘若在这个急速旋转的时代，通讯便捷到可以垄断一切，人们还能够安静的从一张简单而普通的纸上找到感动自己的一笔，我想我的期望便没有落空。​

Paper Experiences

Wang Nan

More than thirty thousand years ago, human beings carved the first mark on cliffs. Once begun, we’ve never stopped since there is no reason for us to resist the impulse for painting. It is the invention of paper that really breaks the ancient way of writing: pictures and characters are no longer limited to stay on static walls; drawings and symbols no longer only exist in heavy vessels. On papers that are blank and light, we awaken not only the world that we live in but also the whole universe through writing and painting. Having replaced the most original carrier of art, paper opens free and private dialogues between human beings and the universe. For thousands of years, in the field of art forms, this kind of ancient and traditional material is becoming an increasingly inclusive aggregation after having undergone the test of time and highly advanced civilizations. Paper is the most widely accepted carrier not only for the final presentation of various kinds of art forms such as ink painting, watercolor, sketch, and manuscripts, but also for the collection of the inspirational flashes in artists’ spiritual world. Norman Bryson believed that, the blankness of paper is a container, in which pictures emerge. This blank space is perceptible but indefinable. To paint is to make a blank paper a painting with only lines and colors. That’s where its significance lies.

There is always miracle on the paper. Nowadays, for all paintings done on the paper, it is the purity and simplicity of paper that highlight the transparency and sincerity shining in each stroke. For artists, drawing is the process of becoming themselves. In drawing sketches, they are always describing who they are through lines, but they never give the answer. The outline of watercolor is the conflicts and compromises between lines and colors. Every piece of watercolor is a perfect interaction performed by paper textures, lavish colors and the consistent penetration of water. Just as Benjamin put it: Watercolor is the only field where colors and lines are in harmony. Here, the outline drawn by the pencil is visible while the pigment is transparent. And in watercolor, the background, although having been colored, is reserved. Paper, intentionally or unintentionally, giving away the traces of artists’ struggling that they suffer when they are faced with the choices about works and materials. They have attempted to erase and to cover up, but in vain. Every piece of paper is a barren land, unbounded and unconstrained. All the inks, colors and flavors gallop here. They chase around, and they mix up. The accidental convergence of these elements on the paper is like a mirror, reflecting the exact producing process and capturing the sudden flashes of inspiration. In oil paintings, sculptures, and installed works, which are covert and complete, neither the process nor the inspiration can be perceived.

The contemporary arts that we are focusing on nowadays is more like to be built on the basis of the subversion and destruction of traditional idea on painting. The so-called creative art forms are all experiments and adjustments about the manifestations of arts without touches to the essence of it. Many non-traditional art forms such as graffiti, Land Art, and Conceptual Art, have gone beyond the boarder of painting while seeking breakthroughs with various kinds of three dimensional renderings. Depending on new medias and advanced science and technologies, these kinds of arts are attempting to dispel the essential core of arts though the logics and concepts of designing. In this age when everything can be called “art”, it’s necessary to transfer our attention back on paper. It is the artists who leave the figure of every inspirational flash to the paper before them. Working on the paper day after day, they are in fact measuring the width of their own lives with their works and each recording process can be a spiritual practice. Only by probing into individuals’ creating process and states can we reveal the inner power berried in artists.

Works of more than one dozen artists are displayed in this art exhibition, and all the artists are post-70s and post-80 generations. Some of them have made many trials in innovations of forms, but eventually regress to the initial state. Lines and colors in works, as the demonstration of painting attitudes, seem to be especially precious nowadays because they represent artists’ efforts in creating private spaces. Some may devote themselves to the vines and veins of a plant, and others remain cautious toward western art forms while reserving their respective styles of outputting their memories. By painting on the paper, artists piece together the fragments of inspirations and thus build the whole process including conceiving, collecting materials, brainstorming, and continuous verifying. So, visitors and even each of us are eager to find out the most original power and drive behind the works. As for the way to exhibit each work, we have broken the traditional practice of hanging on the wall and make the installation flexible. The display of works is personalized according to their styles so as to promote spiritual communication between the dynamic paper and the audience. At this moment, their works go back to the origin and the purity, endowing them with the ability to speak, reminding us repeatedly of “art for art’s sake” and “art for artists’ sake”. This is a different kind of freedom on the paper that art gives.

Artist is the most lasting engine for art. If this exhibition, Paper Experiences, can serve as an epitome of young artists’ works on paper to show the exact creation process and to explain the current structure of the diverse works, the significance of the exhibition will be achieved. We hope to capture the traces of inspiration to keep them floating in the air, echoing around ears and eventually falling into the hearts of every audience. I also hope this exhibition can be an ashram for artists to express in peace their free inspirations on paper. In this rapidly rotating age when the whole world is dominated by the convenience of telecommunication, if visitors can still be touched by one stroke, if not many, on the simple and ordinary paper in this exhibition, all the efforts we have done will be justified.