杨大伟
镜像
一旦他对你谈论他自己，分析就开始了……
——拉康
“镜像”虽然最初是被作为“助于自我形成的”一个阶段，但在整个拉康理论中，它实际上更是一种功能，一种“投射—返回—认同”的功能。在镜子发明以前，所有的人都没有在镜子面前看自己的经历；而镜子发明以后，也并不是所有的人在幼年时期都能有这种经历，湖面、盆中之水……都发挥了镜像的功能。而拉康要指出的正是这种类似场景之下的镜像功能。在拉康引入的镜像阶段的镜像场景中，要素就是互相关联并作用的镜子、主体、镜中之像。我们要设置的艺术创作的镜像对应的就是：绘画、画家、画家的作品。
近年来悄然兴起以镜像为媒介、借助于镜像见证特质的艺术创作思路。一方面，一反传统意义上从纯物质形态层面以“文脉”关系趋同或求异于场所特质的思路，以其非物质形态特质的再现，达到对精神的强化和认同；另一方面，它使得艺术家在面对极具特质的社会环境，不必拘泥、受制于历史性参照物的外在形态特征，在彰显自我的同时，仍能与社会性、历史性环境保持对话。
每个人的生活状态不同，镜像也呈现出了状态的不一致。对于影像敏感的人，镜像则成为他生活状态的另一种表述方式。这会在艺术家本人认为合理的镜子中表述着自己的生活状态。镜像的“真实”成为自以为的“真实”。更值得一提的是，镜子的形状本身就千奇百怪，必然导致了镜像的复杂性和多义性。又多了夸张、重复、变形、歧义和幻觉等等概念的发生。但是，无论是镜像之我还是众人面容之我，其实质都是以某种形象出现的小他者之倒错式的意象，在这种先行到来的强暴性意象关系中，虚假的自我在“自恋式”伪认同的想象关系中被建立起来。可是镜像毕竟属于虚像，具有非物质性。人们看得见、感受得到它的存在，但却摸不着、触及不到它的实在。镜像的非物质性决定了以镜像为媒介的认同思路在于：从非物质形态层面而不是传统意义上的纯物质形态层面特质的见证、回应和认同。
画家冯劲草的作品富有一种超念的力量。画家的自反性、对现实和虚幻的探寻与矛盾使他成为一位不寻常但却很和煦的现代主义艺术实践者。虚幻和记录的交织、反复的试验手法在他的作品中持续不变。虚幻和记录的交织看起来很荒诞，但是细究一下，它分明就是现实世界的影子。冯劲草的艺术创作本来就是把现实放在未来的镜像之中，这样才有了一个对比融合的舞台，两者的相互交融，形成了一个相互借鉴的整体，不可分割。
黑白
知其白，守其黑，为天下式。
――老子
人类在长期的自然环境生存中，日出而作，日落而息，这种黑与白构成了人类视觉的基础，是人类认识世界的最直接体验。黑是未开化的漆黑混沌，白是盘古开凿混沌的气孔，黑白是阴阳，黑白是天地，黑白是虚实等等，其实黑白就是矛盾对立的两个方面。黑白不仅是颜色，更是穷究宇宙本质而类化宇宙的第一概念。知白守黑，运黑布白，“以墨当彩”，一直伴随着中国哲学的玄思及禅学而发展，渐渐形成了独立的艺术审美体系。
“黑白”所描述的主题形象层次，表现无色彩的绘画形式，就如戏剧艺术中“默剧” 的表现，是一种精简、缺陷的形式，一种无声却依然丰富、完整的表现艺术。“黑白”表征真实世界，且包含于真实世界。“黑白”独立于自然光影，也依存于自然光影。黑白绘画的创作表现，是对真实世界的崇敬。画面上的白色部分是隐形结构，每一位观赏者的心理环境，会在视觉主动的引领之下，营造完整的主题图像。这个主题图像需要观赏者的心理空间，在看不到和看得到之间动摇，以营造自己内在的艺术经验。类似的绘画形式，像是在充满日光的环境探向背光的角落，看到的一些影子。这些影子，在大自然间有意、无意的进行，在墙面、在地上这些形象不断变化，有时分、有时合、有时动、时有静，这种无穷尽的自然创造能力，人类无法超越。同时创造者要成为提问者、也要成为表现者。
绘画中最重要的精神支持就是绘画主题的存在感。“黑白”的视觉外在形式，将光的意识强调出来，让光线在黑暗中鲜明的结构自己。画家也会在这个形式的启示下得到一种理性运作模式。冯劲草的创作之路从色彩斑斓到单调冷静，从忠实再现到过滤怀疑，从传统真实观到新的真实观，使得画家近期绘画所传达出的文化含义有别，但这些都是冯劲草面对不同的情境主动坚持理性判断和文化批判的产物。不同的时代情境和社会景象使艺术家在自己的内心世界里做出同样的选择，哪怕这种选择是潜意识的。正是在这个意义上，“黑白”色调始终成为中国当代具有批判性艺术家艺术实践的重要选择之一。
画家总是要参照前人积累的传统经验图式，才能图谋创造。冯劲草也不例外，他的画面层层积染，层层深厚，与画家单纯而丰富的图式结构相配合，营造了画面雄浑的境界。冯劲草最近的作品，把“黑白”的魅力发挥到尽致。他不仅善于把握“面”的稳定和张力，还善于利用象征性皴法、线条的规则律动等等。画面一丝不苟、叠层覆盖的描绘与画面结构同样厚重坚实，尤其是氤氲微茫的“黑”和斑驳陆离的“白”相互作用格外传神。他使用“黑白”图形模式来有意识阐释、概括、演绎一种世界观，进一步形成完整持续的文化及其理论体系。俨然使“黑白”颜色超出了单单作为狭义颜色的概念局限，从而升华为高层、深层，也最具普遍意义的哲学内涵之象征。
冯劲草最近绘画的内在结构和图式，已经取得了令人信服的艺术表现。很显然，他本人也意识到很多画家最致命的问题是图像背后精神指向性的缺失以及图像背后空间感知方式的肤浅。无疑，冯劲草为探索图式背后的艺术精神指向性提供了一个鲜活的视觉范本。
2009/7/4于杭州
Mirrored Image – Black and White
――An impression of Jin-Cao Feng’s new works
Da-Wei Yang
Mirrored Image
Once he has spoken of himself to you, analysis begins……
- Jacques Lacan
Although initially the “Mirrored Image” is used as assistance in certain stages of “self identification” in the Mirror Stage theory of Lacan, it is more a function, with a sort of “launch – return – identify” purpose. Before the invention of the mirror, not a single person had the experience of seeing themselves in front of one; yet after the invention of the mirror, still not everybody could have a childhood with this kind of experience, so lakes and basins of water played this part in the mirroring phenomenon. Lacan is precisely pointing out the mirroring function under this type of scenario. In mirroring situations of Lacan’s “Mirror Stage”, the essentials are the function of, and the relationship between, the mirror, the object and the image inside the mirror. We must set up a similar function for artistic creations, being: the painting, the painter, and the painter’s image.
In recent years, there has been an uprising of new artistic thinking with regards to the characteristics of mirrored images. On one hand, reverting back to traditional sentiments from a purely material level, according to the ‘contextual’ relationship, could unite or divides the thinking of the occasion; on the other hand, when the artist is facing a social community with special characteristics, this allows him to avoid having to argue with, or be restrained by the traditional external characteristics of form, and along with presenting himself, he is able to maintain dialogues with both social and historic cultures.
Each person has a different circumstance in life, and so the mirror reflects differently for each person. For image-sensitive people, the mirrored image thus becomes another medium of expression of their status in life. In the artists’ self-proclaimed reasonable mirror, this will express the artist’s own standing in life. The ‘truth’ in the mirrored image will become the ‘truth’ in life. It is also worth mentioning that the shape of the mirror itself is strange, which is bound to lead to a complex and ambiguous mirrored image. In addition, there are also occurrences of exaggeration, repetition, distortion, hallucination and other such concepts. However, whether it’s one’s mirrored image, or the face that everybody else sees, the essence of the image is in fact the result of some small perversion; in this unprecedented violent relationship the fake self is established through the thoughts of a ‘narcissistic’ pseudo-identity. However, the mirror image is fundamentally virtual, and is immaterial. People can see it, sense its presence, but cannot touch it nor lay a hand on its material. This immateriality determines that the mirrored image is used as a medium to encourage similar trains of thoughts: the witness, response, and identification from the immaterial aspect of a form rather than from the traditional pure material characteristics of a painting.
The works of the painter Jin-Cao Feng have a power for exceeding thought. The artist’s reflexive personality combined with the exploration into and the contradiction between reality and fantasy makes him an extraordinary but contemporary and modernist artist. The interweaving of illusions and facts seem to be very absurd, however upon a closer inspection, it is clearly the shadow of the real world. Feng’s artistic creations fundamentally serves to put the present in the mirrored image of the future, thus creating a comparatively integrated stage on which the two parts mingling together form a whole together, each inseparable from the other.
Black and White
Know the white, yet keep to the black: be a model for the world.
- Lao Tse
Humans survived for a long time in the natural world, working when the sun rises, resting when it sets, so these kinds of set blacks and whites became the foundation of our visual senses, and is the most straightforward experience that mankind have with the world. Black is the uncivilised dark chaos, whilst white the vent through which Pangu severed the chaos, black-and-white is Yin and Yang, the Earth and the Sky, and everything. In actual fact black-and-white serves as both sides of a contradiction. Black-and-white is not just colour, it has a core part in the concept of the universe. Know the white, yet keep to the black; “black ink as colour”, it always accompanies the development of the thoughts of Chinese philosophy and Buddhism, gradually becoming an independent system of art appreciation.
The main thematic plane which is created by “Back and White” shows a monochromatic style of painting, similar to the behaviour of a ‘mime’ on the stage, it is a simple and constrained style, a kind of silent but nonetheless abundant and complete artistic behaviour. “Black and White” is a token of the real world, as well as encompassing it. “Black and White” is independent from the light and shadow of nature, but it also depends upon it. The creation of black and white paintings is in reverence to the real world. The white part on the painting is an invisible structure, the main theme of which will be completed by the psychological environment of each viewer under the instinctive guidance of the psyche. This picture needs the psychological space of the viewer to fluctuate between being able to see and unable to see the painting, and thus create the feeling and experience of being part of the art. This style of artistic experience is similar to that of standing in a sunlit setting whilst looking in a dark corner and its shadows. In nature these shadows have both intentional and unintentional movement, on walls and on the ground they are ever-changing, dividing, connecting, moving, unmoving. This type of unending natural power is insurmountable by mankind. At the same time, the creator must become the questioner and the performer.
In painting, the most important encouragement is to maintain the theme of the painting. The outside visual formation of “Black and White” is accentuated by light, and allows the rays of light to present it’s makeup in the darkness. The painter will also obtain a rational form of process under this. Feng’s path of creation started with an abundance of colours and arrives at a calm monotony, from a faithful representation to one riddled with suspicion, from a traditional realistic viewpoint to a modernistic realistic viewpoint, causing his recent art to contain a different cultural significance. However, this is where Feng has taken the initiative to adhere to the rational judgments and cultural criticisms of products in different situations. Different generations and cultural contexts instigate the same decisions in the inner psyche of the artist, albeit these decisions are subconscious. It is precisely on this note that the tonality of “Black and White” has played an important part in the artistic practice of analytical artists in modern China all along.
Painters must constantly refer to the accumulation of paintings and illustrations of those that had come before them in order to conspire to create pieces of their own. Feng is no exception; his paintings are thick with the amassed paint and profundity of other paintings; combined with the pure and rich composition of his pictures, this creates a forceful realm. Feng used the charm of “Black and White” to its utmost in his newest pieces. Not only does he excel in controlling the stability and the tension in the picture, but he also exceeds in the Chinese techniques of Tsun and line drawing. The meticulous and carefully layered face of the painting and the composition of the painting are both strong, and the interaction between the murky “Black” and the speckled “White” is in a manner that is extraordinary. He uses his “Black and White” paintings to consciously explain, epitomise and deduct a take on the world; further completing the formation of a cultural and theoretical thought system. As the use of “Black and White” exceeds the narrow limitations of using colour, so it rises to a higher and deeper level, and furthermore it becomes a symbol of the most typical form of philosophical ideas.
The inner agenda and composition of Feng’s newest collection has already convinced people of its artistic capacity. It is very obvious that he himself has realised that for many artists the most vital question is that the spirit behind the painting does not point to an empty and lacking perception and the superficiality which led to the conception of this work of art. Without a doubt Feng has contributed a fresh example to the formation of spirit and ideas behind paintings.
2009/7/4 Kang-Zhou Yu
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