紐約中國藝術(shù)展以多樣性超越地域標(biāo)簽

Museums of modern and contemporary art like to talk a big game about globalism, and their big-tent discourse challenges the old assumption that artists can be naturally grouped together by geography. Yet the fact remains: Western artists get the solo shows, while audiences usually discover art from beyond the United States and Europe through exhibitions with a geographic focus — which lump together diverse and sometimes unrelated artists under a national or regional banner.

現(xiàn)當(dāng)代藝術(shù)博物館喜歡談?wù)撽P(guān)于全球化的宏大項(xiàng)目，它們無所不包的話語在挑戰(zhàn)一個(gè)陳舊的觀念：藝術(shù)家是可以根據(jù)地域歸為一些自然的群落的。然而事實(shí)依然是：西方藝術(shù)家能夠獲得個(gè)展，而美國和歐洲之外的藝術(shù)則通常是通過以地理區(qū)域?yàn)橹黝}的展覽展現(xiàn)給觀眾——它們把各不相同甚至毫不相干的藝術(shù)家按照國家或區(qū)域混合到一起。

The reason is in small part a matter of habit and in large part financial. While curators and artists may be skeptical of geographic frames, donors love them.

習(xí)慣問題只是次要原因，資金來源才是主要的。雖然策展人和藝術(shù)家可能對(duì)地理框架有所懷疑，但捐款人很喜歡這些概念。

At the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, three recent exhibitions showcased new acquisitions from South and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, which were harshly criticized in some quarters for eliding differences and segregating non-Western art. (The acquisitions program was paid for by the Swiss bank UBS, which told The New York Times in 2012, “we are refocusing our strategy to reach emerging markets, and this project seemed like a perfect fit.”)

所羅門·R·古根海姆博物館(Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum)最近的三場展覽展示的是新近從南亞、東南亞、拉美和中東購得的作品。有些人尖銳地批評(píng)它們忽視差異，對(duì)非西方藝術(shù)進(jìn)行隔離(該購藏項(xiàng)目由瑞士銀行瑞銀[UBS]資助。2012年，該銀行在接受《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》采訪時(shí)稱，“我們正在重新關(guān)注面向新興市場的戰(zhàn)略，這個(gè)項(xiàng)目似乎與我們的戰(zhàn)略非常契合。”)

Now a new show, “Tales of Our Time,” presents contemporary art from China. Though it, too, makes some doubtful implications about geography as destiny, it is better than its regional predecessors. The works here, by seven artists and collectives from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, were all commissioned by the Guggenheim, with a better than average hit rate. Unlike the three regional shopping sprees, desperate to ascribe unity where little was to be found, this is a more open-ended exhibition that, in its diversity, implicitly rebukes its own reason for being.

現(xiàn)在，一場名為“故事新編”(Tales of Our Time)的新展覽展示了來自中國的當(dāng)代藝術(shù)。雖然它也做出了一些地域即宿命的可疑暗示，但要優(yōu)于之前關(guān)于該地區(qū)的那些展覽。這次展出的作品來自中國大陸、香港和臺(tái)灣的7名藝術(shù)家個(gè)人或團(tuán)體。這些作品都是受古根海姆博物館委約創(chuàng)作的，命中率要高于一般水平。不同于那三場地區(qū)藝術(shù)大掃貨——拼命給毫無共同之處的東西貼上統(tǒng)一的標(biāo)簽——這場展覽更具開放性，它通過自己的多樣性隱晦地譴責(zé)了自己存在的原因。

The artists in “Tales of Our Time” — all born between 1970 and 1980, many familiar from the biennial circuit, several new to me — were chosen by Xiaoyu Weng, an associate curator at the museum, and Hou Hanru, director of the Maxxi museum in Rome who also is a consultant curator to the Guggenheim. (Mr. Hou is also advising the museum on a much bigger, and more promising, exhibition of Chinese art in a global context, “Art and China After 1989: Theater of the World,” which is to open next October.)

“故事新編”的藝術(shù)家們都出生于1970年至1980年，其中很多人是我通過雙年展早已熟悉的，還有幾位對(duì)我來說比較陌生。他們是博物館的助理策展人翁笑雨和羅馬21世紀(jì)國家藝術(shù)博物館(Maxxi)館長侯瀚如挑選的。侯也是古根海姆博物館的顧問策展人(他正在為該博物館在全球背景下探討中國藝術(shù)的一個(gè)規(guī)模更大、更具雄心的展覽提供咨詢，也就是將于明年10月開幕的“1989年之后的藝術(shù)與中國——世界的舞臺(tái)”[Art and China After 1989: Theater of the World])。

The lingua franca of “Tales of Our Time” is video, but there’s one giant sculpture: a crazed industrial robot equipped with a squeegee, installed in a room-size see-through chamber. Programmed by the Beijing artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu, a husband-and-wife duo with a reputation as Chinese enfants terribles, the robot mops up liquid, with the viscosity of molasses and the color of blood, according to a set of rules: When a sensor detects that the liquid has flowed past a certain boundary, the robotic arm swoops down and cleans it up off the floor, and splashes the white gallery walls with the red fluid, like in a slasher film. It’s a legible, if forced, metaphor for the societal hazards of algorithms and automation. It’s also a rather expensive piece of Snapchat bait.

“故事新編”以錄像作品為通用語言，但也有一座巨大的雕塑：一個(gè)裝備著擦刷器的瘋狂工業(yè)機(jī)器人，被安裝在一個(gè)房間大小的透明小室里。這個(gè)項(xiàng)目是北京藝術(shù)家夫婦孫原和彭禹創(chuàng)作的，他們被譽(yù)為中國版的“口無遮攔的孩子”(enfants terribles)。那個(gè)機(jī)器人按照一套規(guī)則，把有著糖漿的粘性和血液的顏色的液體拖干凈：感應(yīng)器探測(cè)到液體流過某個(gè)界線時(shí)，機(jī)器人手臂猛撲下去，把液體從地板上擦干凈，濺到白色的畫廊墻壁上，就像一部砍殺電影。它顯然是在略帶牽強(qiáng)地暗喻電腦算法和自動(dòng)化潛藏的社會(huì)危險(xiǎn)。也是一個(gè)相當(dāng)昂貴的Snapchat誘餌。

Subtler and better is the art by Chia-En Jao, from Taiwan, who interrogates that island’s history, and the ways nationalism can obscure it, with sly humor and an easy hand. In “Taxi,” a rewarding video completed this year, Mr. Jao sits in the back of several cabs en route to Taipei landmarks, like the presidential palace or a memorial to Chiang Kai-shek, and the drivers animatedly kibitz about geopolitics and their own pasts. Abstract discussions about the meaning of nationhood sometimes slip into current events. (“I see the British pound fell today,” Mr. Jao says. “That’s Brexit,” the driver responds. “The U.K. was never very involved in the E.U. anyway.”) Journeys to military sites dredge up memories both painful and playful, prompting one driver to sing an old army ditty: “Take back, take back, take back the mainland!” The taxi drivers’ narratives offer a more plural and personal map of Taiwan, as does a nearby work by Mr. Jao: a flag whose coat of arms incorporates Chinese, Japanese and indigenous Taiwanese fabrics.

臺(tái)灣藝術(shù)家饒加恩的藝術(shù)要更微妙和優(yōu)秀，他用狡猾的幽默和輕松的手法審視臺(tái)灣的歷史，以及民族主義對(duì)歷史的遮掩。在今年完成的一部令人愉悅的錄像作品《計(jì)程車》中，饒加恩坐在幾輛出租車的后座上，前往臺(tái)北的一些地標(biāo)建筑，比如總統(tǒng)府或中正紀(jì)念堂，司機(jī)們熱烈地談?wù)摰鼐壵魏妥约旱倪^往。關(guān)于國家地位的意義的抽象討論有時(shí)會(huì)轉(zhuǎn)向時(shí)事(“今天我看到英鎊下跌了，”饒說。“那是因?yàn)槊摎W，”一位司機(jī)回應(yīng)說，“反正英國從來沒有深度參與歐盟”)。去往軍事地點(diǎn)的旅程充滿痛苦而有趣的回憶，一位司機(jī)唱起了一首軍中的老歌：“反攻，反攻、反攻大陸去!”這些出租車司機(jī)的描述提供了一個(gè)更多樣化和個(gè)性化的臺(tái)灣地圖，就像旁邊饒加恩的另一件作品：一面旗幟，上面的紋徽包括中國、日本和臺(tái)灣原住民的元素。

Two artists, Sun Xun and Zhou Tao, use video to explore China’s industrialization and environmental degradation. Mr. Sun’s “Mythological Time” is a surreal, at times overweening animation set in his northern hometown, Fuxin, which was once home to the largest open-pit coal mine in Asia. Scenes of tanks, miners, fossils and mountains give way to compelling dream sequences, one of which features fishermen hauling a colossal carp beached like a whale. Disconnected vistas scroll across the long screen, recalling the axonometric compositions of Chinese landscapes, though the gruff, energetic paintings that line the walls of the darkened gallery recall the vigorous work of William Kentridge even more than the literati style of classical Chinese art.

孫遜和周滔這兩位藝術(shù)家用錄像探索中國的工業(yè)化和環(huán)境惡化。孫遜的《通向大地的又一道閃電》是一件超現(xiàn)實(shí)主義作品，某些片段是他的北方故鄉(xiāng)阜新的夸張動(dòng)畫場景，那里曾是亞洲最大的露天開采煤礦。貨箱、礦工、化石和山脈的場景過渡為扣人心弦的夢(mèng)境，其中一個(gè)展現(xiàn)的是漁夫們拖著一條像鯨魚那樣擱淺在沙灘上巨大鯉魚。沒有關(guān)聯(lián)的場景沿著長長的銀幕展開，讓人想起了中國風(fēng)景畫的軸側(cè)構(gòu)圖，雖然沿著畫廊灰暗墻壁排列的充滿活力的粗線條繪畫更多地讓人想起威廉·肯特里奇(William Kentridge)的犀利，而非中國傳統(tǒng)藝術(shù)的書卷氣。

Mr. Zhou’s disquieting two-channel video “Land of the Throat,” by contrast, is shot in the south of China: specifically, the Pearl River Delta, the first region of the country oriented to hypercapitalist production in the era of Deng Xiaoping. “Land of the Throat” roams abandoned or sullied sites around Guangzhou and Shenzhen, avoiding character and plot in favor of wordless, melancholy shots that cohere into a lurid dreamscape. A barefoot man trudges across acres of mud; a turtle bobs up out of brackish water. A parched brown landscape is bisected with red-and-white caution tape, and hills have been eroded so badly they appear like wrinkled skin. Mr. Zhou’s Pearl River Delta is a sci-fi dystopia with no need of special effects, an update of Jean-Luc Godard’s “Alphaville” for a century of ecological crisis.

而周滔令人不安的雙屏錄像《咽喉之地》則是在中國南方的珠江三角洲拍攝的，那里是鄧小平時(shí)代第一個(gè)轉(zhuǎn)向狂熱資本主義生產(chǎn)的地區(qū)?！堆屎碇亍仿皆趶V州和深圳周圍被拋棄或破壞的地區(qū)，沒有人物和情節(jié)，只有無聲、陰郁的鏡頭，而后過渡為可怕的夢(mèng)境。一個(gè)赤腳男人在廣袤的泥地上艱難跋涉;一只海龜在污水中上下浮動(dòng)。干裂的褐色土地被紅白警戒線一分為二，小山遭到嚴(yán)重侵蝕，看起來像起皺的皮膚。周滔鏡頭下的珠江三角洲是不需要任何特效的科幻地獄，經(jīng)過一個(gè)世紀(jì)的生態(tài)危機(jī)，它已經(jīng)成為讓-呂克·戈達(dá)爾(Jean-Luc Godard)的《阿爾法城》(Alphaville)的升級(jí)版。

If “Tales of Our Time” and its bank-backed predecessors serve as initial maneuvers to broaden the museum’s collection, then I’m prepared to see these shows’ geographic straitjackets as necessary evils. And the Guggenheim is indeed planning to present a more global cross-section of modern and contemporary art — in Abu Dhabi, where its controversial planned satellite museum, 12 times the size of Frank Lloyd Wright’s spiral museum in Manhattan, will place art from after 1960 in a worldwide framework.

如果說“故事新編”以及之前的三場由銀行資助的展覽是博物館拓寬館藏的初步行動(dòng)，那么我已打算把它們的地域束縛視為必要的犧牲。古根海姆博物館的確正在籌劃推出更全球化的、跨領(lǐng)域的現(xiàn)當(dāng)代藝術(shù)展——規(guī)劃中的那座引發(fā)爭議的阿布扎比分館，面積是曼哈頓這座弗蘭克·勞埃德·賴特(Frank Lloyd Wright)設(shè)計(jì)的螺旋形博物館的12倍，將把1960年之后的藝術(shù)置于全球框架內(nèi)。

As for New York, “Tales of Our Time” and the museum’s coming China megaexhibition offer a welcome opportunity to reckon with art we still see too infrequently. I hope, though, that we start to see more solo shows by the likes of Mr. Zhou, as well as thematic exhibitions that let us appreciate him as more than just a national ambassador.

至于紐約，“故事新編”和該博物館即將開幕的特大型中國展覽給我們提供了難得的機(jī)會(huì)，去思考依然不太常見的藝術(shù)。不過我希望，我們能夠看到更多周滔這樣的藝術(shù)家的個(gè)展和主題展，讓我們能夠不只是把他當(dāng)作一個(gè)國家大使去欣賞。