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（2011年10月发表于《艺术界/LEAP》杂志）
“这灯打得不对！我去过国外的各大美术馆，给这种画打灯，应该从上往下打！”
2011年6月11日，中央美术学院美术馆，“靳尚谊：向维米尔致意”展览的开幕现场。在经历了轮番的领导发言后，所有嘉宾起身上台为展览剪彩，只留下靳尚谊先生一人坐在空荡荡的前排坐席上。待到这冗长的仪式结束，他终于得以站在展出的三件作品前，向身边的王璜生馆长和徐冰副院长脱口而出的便是上面的这一番话，而在他们身边紧紧环绕着的是群情激昂的美院学生、观众、摄影师和记者。三束灯光从远处的墙角射过来，照亮了人们燥热的面孔，在画面上泛起油光。
这是一场盛况空前的“找不同”游戏，有能力自主发现展出作品与维米尔原作之间的差异的观众们都应该给自己颁发一朵小红花。对规则尚不熟悉的朋友也无需担心，展厅内的“高科技”互动平台会亲切地把《惶恐的戴珍珠耳环的少女》与原作《戴珍珠耳环的少女》之间的“面部表情”与“一只手”的差别指给你看，再配合展柜里陈列的曾有幸被靳先生御览过的画册，以及墙面上随处可见的文案与读解，相信你一定能够深谙蕴含在作品中的“后古典”的概念，就像潘公凯院长所阐释的那样。
而似乎是为了回应这股“致意”的风潮，微博上不日便展开了轰轰烈烈的制图活动。以中央美术学院为中心，诸位名家大师那姣好的四分之三侧脸被各路制图高手移花接木在《戴珍珠耳环的少女》的画面上，顿生万种风情。这些拜Photoshop所赐的诙谐之作如同病毒一般地被转发，诞生了一场围观者的狂欢。纵使所有的态度都隐藏在暧昧不明之中，然而挑衅的姿态已清晰可见。
但这远非结局。
展览开幕两周后一个暴雨初歇的夜晚，一场名为“网友之夜”的活动在美术馆大厅如期举行。活动上发布了为靳先生量身订制的iPad画册，又请来三位靳门弟子大发感慨。而那些在微博上疯传的图片则被拿来当成助兴的插曲在大屏幕上滚动播放，像是一封封发自民间的贺电，朝觐的贡品。
在这个“网友之夜”，网络的洪流被招抚，此后没有人再愿意转发这些曾经红极一时的图片。当晚的人群之中，徐冰向冒雨前来的参与者这样说道：“今天晚上，谁来，谁将来就会成为大师！”
“THE LIGHTING’S ALL wrong! I have been to all of the world’s major art museums, and I know, paintings like this need to be lit from directly above!”
June 11, 2011. The opening ceremony for the exhibit “Jin Shangyi: Compliments to Vermeer” at the Central Academy of Fine Arts Museum (CAFAM) in Beijing. After the rounds of speeches by various important personages, all the invited VIPs stood up on stage to cut the ribbon for the exhibition. Only Jin Shangyi—the 77- year-old Chairman of the Chinese Artists Association and former CAFA president—stayed put, sitting all alone in his front-row seat. And only after the whole tedious ceremony was over was he ready to stand before three of the works on view and, swarmed by adoring art students, spectators, photographers, and journalists, blurt out the above words in the presence of CAFAM director Wang Huangsheng and CAFA vice president Xu Bing. The three lights in question shone from a distant corner, illuminating the hot faces of the packed-in guests standing in the way, and oozing gaudily off the surfaces of the paintings they eventually reached.
Shown after the opening of “Jin Shangyi: Compliments to Vermeer,” the Photoshop rendition of Jin Shangyi as The Girl with a Pearl Earring as seen on Weibo
The whole exhibition was a glorified game of “spot the difference” between Jin Shangyi’s paintings and the original Vermeers. Attendees who could were supposed to award themselves a small red flower. Yet those who weren’t up to the art-historical task had nothing to worry about; they had “high-tech” interactive stations to walk them through the discrepancies in “facial expression” and “hands” between Jin’s The Terrified Girl with the Pearl Earring and Vermeer’s un-terrified original. Throw in the accompanying display of catalogues—once upon a time, personaly handled by Mr. Jin himself—and the many documents and explanatory blurbs scattered around the exhibition, and you’d have no trouble wrapping your mind around the “post-classicism” of the works on view, as current CAFA president Pan Gongkai admiringly praised them.
Almost as if in response to this wave of “Compliments,” over the next few days Weibo exploded in an outbreak of digitally manipulated creations. Some of CAFA’s most eminent personages suddenly found their beautiful faces arrayed in three-quarter profile, swapped by devious Photoshop masters into the spot formerly occupied by Vermeer’s Girl. It was funny stuff, and it spread like wildfire across Weibo, driven by reveling onlookers. Even though they kept their true attitudes carefully ambiguous, the piquant scent of provocation was readily detectable. These were students and teachers at semester’s end, after all.
But that was hardly the end of the story. Two weeks after the opening ceremony, during a brief break in what would prove to be an entire evening’s worth of torrential rain, CAFAM staged a “Night of the Netizen” in its main hall. At the event, Jin was the recipient of a “bespoke” iPad loaded with the full range of pearl-earringed parodies. The netizen creations so enthusiastically posted and re-posted in the days prior now rolled across the big screen for the audience’s enjoyment, their presence like a telegram from the masses, articles of tribute offered up in the hall of the masters.
Just for one night, this “Night of the Netizens,” the unruly hordes of online rebels were granted refuge inside the palace walls. And, interestingly enough, no sooner had the rainy night’s event ended than the torrent of reimagined Vermeers dried up. As Xu Bing expressed to the youthful participants who braved the rain to attend, “You, who have turned up tonight, are the masters of the future!”
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（2011年6月发表于《艺术界/LEAP》杂志）
在MP3号展位里刚刚坐定，徐震掏出手机开始刷微博，陈冠希的助理一个箭步冲上来：吸油、补妆、抹发胶。这已经是没顶公司在五天之内亮相的第二个展览了，当事人应对得相当从容，而对于大明星来说，这不过是又一个“通告”。我们的采访者是个小姑娘，有些怯生生的。不过，待到“action”喊过，陈冠希便立刻用招牌式的笑容慰藉了她那颗少女的芳心。
话题一起，徐震就显得相对寡言，只以“是我们这边”一句回答了关于谁先提出合作意向的追问。而陈冠希则看起来兴致不错，连连不绝地讲他与没顶公司惺惺相惜的际遇和仅有过两次的会面，“就好像我去他家，然后他再来我家”。谈说起本次合作，双方从开始接触到最终成形，前后耗时四五个月。对于没顶公司来说，其中最大段的时间用在了“告诉中间所有的人我们是在做艺术”，而冠希方面则认为主要花费在了“从联系我本人到真正碰面”这个相当显派头的过程里。谈及艺术，陈冠希强调了他在想法与概念上的多样性与主动性，没顶公司则采取了“Edison有想法，我们来做创作”的姿态，有时候还会给点儿建议。
在所有人的眼中，陈冠希的“特殊身份”自是一个无法回避的亮点，此问一经抛出，沉默的徐震立刻愉快地抢过来反问“特殊在哪里”。提问的女孩儿旋即作无辜状，“他是个艺人啊！”于是徐震松快地靠回椅背上，“其实，他也是个普通人，他的感受也是来自每天自己生活中的⋯⋯”
如同在看一场娱乐新闻，做偶像的都十分热衷于把自己树立成一个励志的榜样。借着惯性，“陈老师”也熟练地向我们抛出了“想做就去做”的论调鼓励大家，并不忘感谢没顶公司，感谢工作人员。当然，穿插一些具有强烈生活感的家庭小趣闻也是少不了的，比如圣诞节妈妈把陈冠希三岁时候的画作拿出来当作礼物送给他这种温馨动人、如梦似幻的肥皂剧桥段是对付粉丝们用的杀手锏。此外，如此早慧的童年经历想必也折煞了不少艺术家“同行们”。
在二十分钟的对话中，不乏双方互诉衷肠的部分。徐震认为当初找陈冠希合作是因为“他是一个年轻艺术家，而且人品非常好。”陈冠希则称赞徐震“喜欢开玩笑”。临近尾声，两人更是敞开了心扉，跨越了艺术圈与娱乐圈的鹊桥，认定了彼此是未来艺术方面唯一的合作伙伴。对于这一抉择，明星不无感慨地补充道，“MadeIn很支持和相信我。因为很难得有人相信陈冠希，不知道为什么”，接着便笑出了声。
这次访谈被不失时机地同步发布在了新浪微博上，一时间粉丝群起、转发连连，有人还插科打诨地贴出了些旧日的老照片。陈冠希的追随者们用文字无声地尖叫着，徘徊在展场内外的人们也在发表着卓有立场的评论，而没顶公司的官方微博则更是一条不落地转发了访谈的内容与花絮。所有人都在忙着各取所需，至于究竟展出了什么作品，谁还在问呢？回想起近几年没顶公司的创作，总有些察之不觉的认真劲儿和似是而非的幽默感，能够在观众即将得出结论的一瞬间打断已上喉头的笑声。而这一次，他们彻底地把自己卷入其中，玩儿得足够大方、轰动——光天化日之下，抛玉引砖，但求惊堂一声拍桌响。
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（2011年4月发表于《艺术界/LEAP》杂志）
“你不是个小玩意儿”听上去相当有趣，对吧？在成为艺门画廊的群展主题之前，它是去年美国的一本畅销书的书名。后者所言的“小玩意儿（gadget）”意指股掌之间的电子设备，书中讨论了这些小玩意是如何挟持了我们的社交和习惯，呼吁人们在“玩物丧志”之前，先在现实中成就一个自己。这个展览也借用了出版物的书名和作为海报的封面。而策展人的意图似乎也是希望借由展览来进行一次“翻拍”，阐释与原著相一致的主旨。
展览展出的作品涉及互联网时代的林林总总。冷文在《桌面》系列中泄露了网线一端的姑娘们堆叠着层层窗口的电脑桌面，展示了她们苦心经营的兴趣爱好和生活状态，让掩映其中的面孔显得沉默和乏味。再转眼看卢征远的《房间里的月亮》，寂寞空虚得就像高潮过后的不应期。
或许，正当男男女女醉心于“虚拟现实”的幻象之中时，偷偷潜入电子邮箱里的伟哥小广告却在提醒着一个“力不从心”的现实。在这组名为《我的垃圾邮件》的作品里，庄辉和旦儿把色彩亮丽、像素低劣的广告图片放大到了一张挂毯的尺寸，滑腻的丝绸和闪烁的晶体赐予了它们体面而庸俗的躯壳。这些不请自来的讯息竟然知晓所有的秘密，带来对你的关切和八折的优惠。
想聊聊艺术吗？放肆的言论和真正有趣的八卦混迹在网络论坛的留言板里。任何人都可以用游客的账号发起一场攻击身份是靠不住的，只有过目即逝的观点和十五分钟的明星。正如陈劭雄通过《上传下载》系列的画面所呈现的那样，信息交互是色彩斑斓的，也是混乱嘈杂的。自由而开放的平台可以是一桌筵席也可以是一只马桶。
信息之传递大可比与物之分享。在黄然创作的影像作品中，画面上的人物专注又茫然地轮番咀嚼那块仅有的口香糖。过程中，它原有的味道逐渐失去，但参与者口腔内的成分却使它愈发丰富。而《下一轮才是真实的生活》，这一标题又把整个过程带入了无尽的循环。
在这件影像作品对面的小空间里，鄢醒则通过讲述的行为，尝试着为人们公开一段有关他自己的真实的生活。在近两个钟头的时间，他面对一堵白墙，用复杂的情绪向身后的听众描述着他生活中的人物和层出的纠葛，渲染着丰富的细节，真实得让人生疑。这一大胆的作品中有着一个年轻人对生活经历的如同歌女一般的痛陈，以及对他仅能把握的个人历史的彻底清算。他向人们说明着是什么造就了今天这个摇曳放浪的鄢醒，让人理解他为何总想对自己中意的男人喊一声“爸爸”——而作品的名称，就叫做《DADDY》。鄢醒行为的整个过程通过摄像机同步记录了下来，屏幕上的他只有一个背影，没有确切的身份。既往不再的行为和重复播放的影像完成了从“真实”到“虚拟”的转录。
同处一室的作品联结起了一个讨论的语境，从现实世界到信息幻境之间的轮回端点也就此衔接。此时，“小玩意儿”一词看上去更像是指向了参与这场轮回的你我，“你不是个小玩意儿”一句则像是艺术家们联袂引出的结论。他们抛去了“翻拍”的束缚，给自己颁发了一个原创剧本奖。
The recent group exhibition at Pékin Fine Arts alludes to a bestselling book of the same title in the United States last year. The book identifies how “gadgets”—handheld electronic devices, particularly smartphones—have effectively hijacked our modes of socialization, constructing a virtual world that has made it difficult to locate the self in our current state of reality. The works featured in the exhibition deal with the overwhelming scope and influences “gadgets” on life in the Internet age.
Leng Wen’s “Desktop” series shows computers overflowing with pictures of her friends, who all participate in a form of online exhibitionism, painstakingly shaping their profiles to put themselves and their obsessions on display. Then there is Lu Zhengyuan’s “The Moon in My Room,” where one look leaves the viewer with a hollow feeling—the lonesome sort of emptiness that accompanies the refractory period after a climax.
Men and women alike become wrapped up in the illusion of “virtual reality.” With the Viagra ads that sneakily steal into our inboxes, these solicitations serve as reminders of our corporeal reality and elusive nature of fulfillment. In their group of works entitled “My Spam Box,” Zhuang Hui and Dan’er brighten the colors and enlarge the images of pixelated advertisements to fit the dimensions of hanging tapestries. Creamy silk and sparkling crystals adorn the ads with bodies both dignified and vulgar. It’s as if those unsolicited messages somehow know a person’s every secret, offering special discounts that target the personal space of a single user’s e-mail account.
Want to talk about art? Unbridled free speech and gossip floods online message boards, where anyone can use a guest account to launch an attack. Identities become mutable and unstable in a fleeting flux of opinions and fifteen-minute celebrities. This characterization of the Internet is manifested in the “Upload Download” series where, with painted images, Chen Shaoxiong renders the exchange of information in colorful, noisy, and chaotic contours. The transmission of information becomes a sharing of material things. In Huang Ran’s video piece, The Next Round is True Life, the figures on screen appear entranced, revealing vacant stares as they take turns chewing the same piece of gum. The gum gradually loses its flavor, but the mouths of the participants add new dimensions to the experience.
In the small space opposite this video work, Yan Xing makes use of performative narration, facing a white wall for nearly two hours. With his back to the audience, he engages in an intricately emotional description of the people in his life and the disputes that once unfolded between them. The story is recounted in such rich detail that it is “real” to the point of raising suspicion. Revealing with full exposure a liquidation of personal history, the audience becomes aware of Yan Xing’s trajectory through life. They come to understand why it is that “Daddy” will always be his favorite man—thus the title, DADDY. Yan Xing’s performance is documented in video; on the screen, he stands before unchanging, nondescript shadowy forms. His performance, when accompanied by the projection of the video recording, constitutes a mediation between the “real” and the “virtual.”
The works that occupy the common exhibition space provide a context for discussion; the cyclically recurring borderline between the real world and the informational dreamscape further reflect this convergence. At this point, the term “gadget” actually seems to refer to the individuals themselves who participate in this negotiation between the “real” and the “virtual.” In fact, it appears that to say “you are not a gadget” is a conclusion that the artists have come to hand in hand. They have cast off the constraints inherent in adapting a book, taking instead the award for “Best Original Screenplay.”
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（2010年10月发表于《艺术界/LEAP》杂志）
上海世博会中国馆里，北宋张择端的《清明上河图》的图像被投影在墙壁之上。此时，这张名画已经被演绎成有趣的巨幅动态水墨图像——八百年前汴京市井的样貌是古代城市生活在中国艺术史中的名典，是今人每每回忆起来便会锁定的目标。时过境迁，这张描绘北方民间的画卷在如今上海的灯光下已经尽显疲态，却也比世博轴上散见的艺术奇观更切合这场狂欢的主题。
上海的城市灵魂在万国旗下、弄堂巷里，这里是王韬程定居的地方。他的家乡成都也是个市井气味浓郁的地方，邻里的流言飞语在街头的麻将桌上流传：市井细民是最拿自己当回事儿的人，生活对他们来说是顶要紧的，勾心斗角也能被说得惊心动魄。
出生上世纪八十年代初的王韬程擅长攫取这些必要的琐屑，无论是电影的情节还是真实的家长里短，他都能把一个画面变成一场折子戏来咿呀弹唱。而水墨的媒材更让他的绘画显出超越其年龄的老派，也赋予每一个场景南方特有的湿润，贴切地把魂飞魄散的水墨创作带回到了它当去的地方。
王韬程自己的形象出现在他每一幅的创作中：留着八字胡，面容暧昧女气，偶尔腾云驾雾，有隋唐壁画里菩萨的风韵。他以这种无所不能的身份穿梭在画面中的楼宇窗棱之间，淡定地偷窥、认真地讲述。他把自己放置在了一个凭空的位置上，扮演了一个跨越性别、存灭、现实与幻境的角色，把体验的对象极大地扩展到身外。拿自己当回事儿的人不在乎自己是谁，而是总要在别人的生活里插上一脚，毕竟一个人的生活太渺小、太单调，潜入每个人的生活才是他追求的化境。
如果把王韬程感知到的世界拍成电影，也一定是超现实的。在他的海报系列里，离奇的场景配上了一本正经描画上的片名，却并没有一般逻辑上的联系。这种不相干的际遇调侃了画面，也调侃了试图一探究竟的观者，虚张声势地张罗了一出闹剧之后，把那些看似有序的牵连打回到了本该混沌的原形。 在“站台中国”昏暗闷热的展厅里，观者可以从桌面上取一把蒲扇再取一支手电筒，登时变得有了街头巷尾打听消息的闲杂人等的模样。那些闲言碎语就铺陈在堆起的桌案上，凭着市井经历给予人们的十二万分的好奇，借着手电的微光便可以一一查看，变成一个有谈资的生活着的人。
想来张择端也定是对市井琐碎深有通悟，不描绘不足以称快的。这两场南北对调、今古穿越的展览讲的都是行走在街巷里的新鲜，而城市的美好就在于公共空间里能享用彼此的生活，在那里活个通透的人便自可以腾云驾雾、羽化成仙了。
In the China Pavilion of the Shanghai Expo, the image of Qingming Festival—the twelfth-century work of Zhang Zeduan of the Northern Song—is projected onto the wall. By now, this famous painting has played itself out as a popular, massive, dynamic ink creation—throughout the course of Chinese art history, Zhang’s depiction of the Bianjing city marketplace eight hundred years ago has served as a classic portrayal of ancient city life; more often than not, it has been the archetype that people of each period have sought out in their own recollections. But circumstances change with the passage of time, and the indubitable obsolescence of this grand scroll depiction of the northern folk of old has been exposed by the work of a contemporary artist in the present Shanghai.
The soul of Shanghai is under the Expo’s many national flags, in an alleyway—this is the place where Wang Taocheng has settled. The artist’s hometown, Chengdu, is a place rich with the aura of an old city marketplace, where neighborhood gossip spreads from one street corner mahjong table to another, and where residents take themselves more seriously than anything else. As far as they are concerned, their little town-bound existence is a very serious matter, and infighting schemes and intrigues classify as soul-stirring events. Though born in the eighties, Wang Taocheng is skilled when it comes to picking up on these critical trivialities; whether out of the plot of a film or the reality of neighborhood trifles, he can take a tableau of petty arguments and transform it into the squeakings and squawkings of the lively original scene. His use of ink gives his paintings even more of an old-fashioned sensibility, one that surpasses his age. The medium also gives each scene that feeling of that humidity so unique to the south, in such an intimate way that viewing becomes traveling.
Wang Taocheng’s own image appears in each of one of his creations—his handlebar mustache or his ambiguously feminine face occasionally ride along the clouds and mount the mists with the charm of a bodhisattva in a Sui or Tang mural. It is from this position of omnipotence that he flies from window ledge to window ledge in his paintings, poised in his voyeurism and earnest in his story-telling. He positions himself in thin air, extending his senses as far as possible beyond the self so as to learn about the objects of his work; Wang plays a role that transcends male or female, reality or fantasy. People who focus in on the trifles do not care who they are themselves, they just stick their noses into the lives of others. The ability to sneak into everybody else’s life, then, becomes the ultimate kind of transformation.
In the dim gallery, the viewer can take a pushan (palm leaf fan) and a flashlight from the table, and instantly assume the role of an idle outsider poking around after the latest news. Gossip is spread across the table, and rising out of the pile are the twelve seasoned town gossip providers on whom curious people depend. By the dim light of flashlights it is actually possible to examine, and in turn to become the person who lives to converse.
Presumably, Zhang Zeduan also had a deep reaching understanding of the trifles of the city marketplace when he painted Qingming Festival. Choosing not to depict that scene would have meant not doing enough to express the joy of its trivialities. Whether it is Zhang Zeduan’s north or Wang Taocheng’s south, ancient or contemporary, both are about the refreshing experience of strolling through the streets. The beauty of the Chinese city exists most in those public spaces where people can enjoy one another’s lives—and where their lives and the lives of those around them are watched by a transparent person who represents the whole event, riding the clouds, mounting the mists, and spreading his wings.
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城市里拥有一个成熟的艺术中心，不仅仅是为艺术作品安排了一个容身之所，也在其他艺术机构造访的时候，能找出一个体面的庄家。
《往返：北京－纽约 现在》五月末在尤伦斯当代艺术中心开幕，展出的作品来自身家显赫的多姆斯收藏。其中来自纽约的有四位艺术家：许汉威，首次在北京表演行为艺术，也带来了镜中世界的装饰作品；马修·戴·杰克逊（Matthew Day Jackson）材料应用丰富的装置和画作；莱恩·麦克金利（Ryan McGinley），这个极具被侵犯气质的青年摄影师带来了怀有圣诞节气质的作品；巴纳比·弗纳斯（Barnaby Furnas），隐喻丰富的《红海（临近）》尺幅巨大、挥洒恣肆。邀请的来自北京的艺术家包括：杨福东专注的黑白影像《陌生天堂》，它和曹斐个人气质强烈的喧闹的《怒》并置迥然；李松松的《猪时代》，用铝板油彩的极具质感的形式表现了一个不着边际的主题；刘韡在截取的《七个夜》之外，还在门厅展出了荒诞的《瓷器》；李晖意境与形式相得益彰的《轮回》被极好地实现，展现出惊人的效果。
展出作品的主题涉及城市、生态、宗教、神话和生命本身，在这两个能够体现国家气质的城市之间寻找着共同关心的论点，从语境的交集处寻找话题，进行着擦肩而过的跨语际对话。像两组喊山的青年，为了一个似是而非的回声。“往返”概念中有着无觅终际的大循环，是一个富有野心的开始，是对这两个意识形态中心间用之不竭的话题的觊觎；这个宽泛而讨巧的概念可以承载任意多个的来回，是明显的对未来机会的预见。
艺术中心和收藏机构之间的合作有着明显的共赢作用。一方面为艺术中心拓展了话语的疆界，寻觅到更多可以取用的资源，建立更有层次的框架；另一方面对于收藏机构来说，展出藏品，使其大量应用于艺术教育和艺术传播，是实现机构运行和循环的上选。通过全球范围的机构合作，多姆斯将自身的终端移植到本地化的主体，以精练的操作和投入，产出有深度的成果。同时，也为艺术机构的馆际合作牵线搭桥，将放射状的合作链条转化为网状。在6月1日的对话中，古根汉基金会、博物馆馆长理查德·阿姆斯特朗（Richard Armstrong）明白地提出共同收藏的预想，使得对其此行目的的诸多揣测有了方向。
《往返：北京－纽约 现在》更像是巨头们在云端的会际，一番电光火石才有了展览的形体。它无疑是中国大型艺术机构国际化发展的风向标，也是呼吁已久的新的收藏、展览模式的问路和试水。尤伦斯当代艺术中心在不断牺牲的同时也在不断地增生，在这个遍布处女地的体制下寻找最温柔的入口。在其仓皇的本地化进程中，尤伦斯还能够发出这样一个自信的信号，这让它有一次地变成了一个舶来的炮灰和希望。