旅行的藝術:旅行中的特定場所-6

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黃昏時分，汽車沿著盤旋的公路穿行于大片森林之中。車頭燈的強光，不時射在路旁大片的草地和路旁的樹干上，以至于每塊樹皮和每根草莖的形貌都清晰可辨。在森林里，車燈的光線慘白、強烈，似乎更適用于醫(yī)院病房。汽車繞過彎，車燈照在似在昏睡的路面上，這些草地和樹干又沒入一片黑暗中。

As the car slips along a winding road through the woods at dusk, its powerful headlamps momentarily light up whole sections of meadow and tree trunks, so brightly that the texture of the bark and individual stalks of grass can be made out in a clinical white light better suited to a hospital ward than woodland, and then dip them back into the undifferentiated murkiness as the car rounds the corner and the beams turn their attention to another patch of slumbering ground.

一路上很少見到別的車輛，偶爾碰到的，也是迎面來的，亮著車燈，像是在逃離其身后夜的黑暗。車內(nèi)昏暗，儀表板發(fā)出紫色的光。突然，在前方一塊空闊地上出現(xiàn)一片亮光——是一個加油站。這是這條公路駛?cè)脒@最茂密也是最大的一片森林之前的最后一個加油站，再往前方，一切都將落入黑夜的掌心——這就是油畫《加油站》所表現(xiàn)的場景。加油站的管理員離開了房間，在油泵前檢查汽油存量。房間內(nèi)溫暖明亮，燈光強烈，一如正午的煦陽正撒滿室外的大院。室內(nèi)也許還有一只收音機在開著。管理室靠墻處，除了有糖點、雜志、地圖和車用窗簾，也許還整齊地擺著一排油桶。

There are few other cars on the road, only an occasional set of lights moving in the opposite direction, away from the night. The car's instrument panel casts a purple glow over the darkened interior. Suddenly, in a clearing ahead, a floodlit expanse appears: a petrol station, the last before the road heads off into the longest, densest stretch of forest and night completes its hold over the land-Gas (1940). The manager has left his cabin to check the level on a pump. It is warm inside and light as brilliant as that of the midday sun washes across the forecourt. A radio may be playing. There may be cans of oil neatly lined up against one wall, along with sweets, magazines, maps and window cloths.

和十三年前創(chuàng)作的《自動販賣店》一樣，《加油站》表現(xiàn)的也是一種孤獨：一座加油站獨立于越來越濃的暮色中。在霍珀的畫筆下，這種孤獨同樣呈現(xiàn)得強烈深刻且令人神往。畫布右邊像霧一樣開始蔓延的黑暗同加油站形成鮮明對照，黑暗是恐懼的信使，而加油站是安全的象征。夜幕降臨之際，在這處在原始森林邊緣的人類最后的一個駐足點，應該比白天的城市更容易讓人生出親近的感覺。咖啡機和雜志，作為人類小小的欲望和虛榮的象征，對應著加油站外寬闊無垠的非人類的世界和綿亙數(shù)英里的森林，而在這森林里，不時還可以聽見熊和狐貍腳下樹枝的斷裂聲。畫作給人的暗示可謂意味深長：在一份雜志的封面上，用鮮亮的粉紅色突出著今年夏天流行紫色指甲油的信息；咖啡機對我們發(fā)出無聲的呼喚：正在播散新鮮烘焙的咖啡豆的芳香。在這公路即將進入無邊森林的最后一站，我們會發(fā)現(xiàn)自己同他人之間的共通性遠遠超出差異性。

Like Automat , painted thirteen years before it, Gas is a picture of isolation. A petrol station stands on its own in the impending darkness. But in Hopper's hands, the isolation is once again made poignant and enticing. The darkness that spreads like a fog from the right of the canvas, a harbinger of fear, contrasts with the security of the station. Against the backdrop of night and wild woods, in this last outpost of humanity, a sense of kinship may be easier to develop than in daylight in the city. The coffee machine and magazines, tokens of small human desires and vanities, stand in opposition to the wide non-human world outside, to the miles of forest in which branches crack occasionally under the footfall of bears and foxes. There is something touching in the suggestion-made in bold pink on the cover of one magazine-that we paint our nails purple this summer and in the invocation above the coffee machine to sample the aroma of freshly roasted beans. In this last stop before the road enters the endless forest, it is what we have in common with others that looms larger than what separates us.

愛德華·霍珀：《加油站》，1940年