旅行的藝術(shù):藝術(shù) Ⅶ 令人眼界大開(kāi)的藝術(shù)-3

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然而，幸好，凡·高在藝術(shù)上有著勃勃雄心，他不相信先前的藝術(shù)家已經(jīng)捕捉到了法國(guó)南部的所有風(fēng)光。在他看來(lái)，許多藝術(shù)家的作品遺漏了事物的精華。“賢明的主啊，我已經(jīng)看過(guò)一些畫(huà)家的作品，他們根本沒(méi)有真正畫(huà)出這些事物，”他歡呼道，“在這里我還有充足的發(fā)揮空間。”

Nevertheless, and fortunately for his artistic ambitions, Van Gogh did not believe that previous artists had captured everything there was to see in southern France. Many had in his view completely missed the essentials. 'Good Lord, I have seen things by certain painters which did not do justice to the subject at all,' he exclaimed. 'There is plenty for me to work on here.'

舉個(gè)例子，沒(méi)有人曾經(jīng)捕捉過(guò)阿爾勒鎮(zhèn)上中年中產(chǎn)階級(jí)婦女獨(dú)特的形象。“這里有一些婦女像弗拉戈納爾 [11] 或是雷諾阿 [12] 畫(huà)中的人物。但是，這里還有一些女人是此前在繪畫(huà)中從未被賦予某種標(biāo)記的 （斜體為德波頓所標(biāo)）。”他還發(fā)現(xiàn)自己在阿爾勒鎮(zhèn)外看到的在田間勞作的農(nóng)夫也被藝術(shù)家忽略了：“米勒重新喚起了我們的思考，使我們能夠看到大自然中的居民。但是，直到現(xiàn)在仍然沒(méi)有人畫(huà)出真正的法國(guó)南方人。”“我們現(xiàn)在已經(jīng)基本知道如何去看待農(nóng)夫了嗎？不，幾乎沒(méi)有人知道如何將他們表現(xiàn)出來(lái)。”

No one had, for example, captured the distinctive appearance of the middle-aged, middle-class women of Arles: 'There are some women like a Fragonard and like a Renoir. But there are some that can't be labelled with anything that's ever been done yet in painting ［my italics］.' The farm labourers he saw working in the fields outside Arles had also been ignored by artists: 'Millet has reawakened our thoughts so that we can see the dweller in nature. But until now no one has painted the real Southern French man for us.' 'Have we in general learned to see the peasant now? No , hardly anyone knows how to pull one off.'

在凡·高于1888年踏上普羅旺斯之前，百年來(lái)一直有畫(huà)家把這個(gè)地方的景色搬上畫(huà)布。普羅旺斯比較知名的藝術(shù)家有弗拉戈納爾、康斯坦丁、畢道爾和艾吉耶 [13] 。他們?nèi)慷际乾F(xiàn)實(shí)主義畫(huà)家，他們都信奉一個(gè)經(jīng)典的，而且較少引起爭(zhēng)議的觀點(diǎn)，即他們的任務(wù)就是在畫(huà)布上展現(xiàn)一個(gè)視覺(jué)世界的精確版本。他們走進(jìn)普羅旺斯的田野、山川，畫(huà)出了栩栩如生的柏樹(shù)、林子、青草、麥子、云朵和公牛。

The Provence that greeted Van Gogh in 1888 had been the subject of painting for over 100 years. Among the betterknown Provençal artists were Fragonard (1732-1806), Constantin (1756-1844), Bidauld (1758-1846), Granet (1775-1849) and Aiguier (1814-1865). All were realistic painters, adhering to the classical and, until then, relatively undisputed notion that their task was to render on canvas an accurate version of the visual world. They went out into the fields and mountains of Provence and painted recognizable versions of cypresses, trees, grass, wheat, clouds and bulls.

然而凡·高卻堅(jiān)持認(rèn)為，他們中的大部分并沒(méi)有畫(huà)出這些景物的神髓，對(duì)普羅旺斯的描繪不夠真切。我們傾向于將那些充分表達(dá)出周遭世界核心要素的圖畫(huà)稱為現(xiàn)實(shí)主義的作品。但是世界是如此復(fù)雜，并足以使兩幅描繪同一個(gè)地方的現(xiàn)實(shí)主義作品因藝術(shù)家風(fēng)格和氣質(zhì)的不同，而呈現(xiàn)出完全不同的景象。兩個(gè)現(xiàn)實(shí)主義畫(huà)家有可能坐在同一片橄欖林的一端，創(chuàng)作出迥異的素描。每一幅現(xiàn)實(shí)主義作品都代表一種選擇，畫(huà)家從真實(shí)世界中選取他認(rèn)為突出的特質(zhì)來(lái)表現(xiàn)；沒(méi)有一幅繪畫(huà)作品可以捕捉整個(gè)世界，就好像尼采略帶嘲諷地指出的那樣：

Yet Van Gogh insisted that most had failed to do justice to their subjects. They had not, he claimed, produced realistic depictions of Provence. We are apt to call any painting realistic that competently conveys key elements of the world. But the world is complex enough for two realistic pictures of the same place to look very different depending on an artist's style and temperament. Two realistic artists may sit at the edge of the same olive grove and produce divergent sketches. Every realistic picture represents a choice of which features of reality are given prominence; no painting ever captures the whole, as Nietzsche mockingly pointed out in a bit of doggerel verse entitled:

現(xiàn)實(shí)主義畫(huà)家

THE REALISTIC PAINTER

“完全忠實(shí)于自然”——天大的謊言：

Completely true to nature！'-what a lie:

自然怎么會(huì)被局限于一幅畫(huà)中？

How could nature ever be constrained into a picture?

自然最小的部分已是無(wú)窮！

The smallest bit of nature is infinite!

因此他只是畫(huà)出了他喜歡的。

And so he paints what he likes about it.

那么什么是他喜歡的？他喜歡他所能畫(huà)出的！

And what does he like? He likes what he can paint!

如果我們喜歡某個(gè)畫(huà)家的作品，那可能是因?yàn)?，我們認(rèn)為他或她選擇了我們認(rèn)為對(duì)于一片景色來(lái)說(shuō)最有價(jià)值的特征。有些選擇是如此敏銳，以至于它們逐漸成了一個(gè)地方的定義，只要我們到那個(gè)地方去旅行，就必然會(huì)想起某位偉大藝術(shù)家所描繪的特征。

If we in turn like a painter's work, it is perhaps because we judge that he or she has selected the features that we believe to be the most valuable about a scene. There are selections so acute that they come to define a place, we can no longer travel through it without being reminded of what a great artist noticed there.

換言之，比如，如果我們抱怨畫(huà)家為我們畫(huà)的肖像不像我們本人，我們并不是在指責(zé)這個(gè)畫(huà)家欺騙了我們。只是我們覺(jué)得，或許這件藝術(shù)作品創(chuàng)作的選擇過(guò)程出了差錯(cuò)，那些我們認(rèn)為應(yīng)該屬于精華部分的地方?jīng)]有被給予足夠的重視。拙劣的藝術(shù)可以被定義為一連串錯(cuò)誤選擇的后果，該表現(xiàn)的沒(méi)有表現(xiàn)出來(lái)，該省略的卻又呈現(xiàn)出來(lái)。

Alternatively, if we complain that, for example, a portrait of us does not look 'like us', we are not accusing a painter of trickery. We simply feel that the process of selection that goes on in any work of art has gone wrong, and that parts of us which we think of as belonging to our essential selves have not been given their due. Bad art might thus be defined as a series of bad choices about what to show and what to leave out.

凡·高對(duì)絕大多數(shù)在他之前已經(jīng)描繪過(guò)法國(guó)南部的畫(huà)家進(jìn)行了抱怨，認(rèn)為他們沒(méi)有把最本質(zhì)的東西表現(xiàn)出來(lái)。

And leaving the essential out was precisely Van Gogh's complaint against most of the artists who had painted southern France until his own day.