藝術家作品陳述

藝術家作品陳述：

作品“龍卷風”在悉尼的白兔美術館展出之后（圖3），采訪和評論中都談論到該作品在環保和生態上的意義。作為中國這個人口大國，如果實現每個人都能夠像美國人一樣的生活方式，對于生態可能是災難性的，從我們每一天所產生的塑料瓶就可見一斑。盡管作品“龍卷風”的材料我使用了在中國哪里都可以找到的廢棄塑料瓶，但這不是一件宣傳環保的作品，如果環顧我2010年完成的三件作品就可以看到我的興趣是材料和環境的關系——找到能夠表達今天感受的藝術材料。

我們已經處在一個什么都可以是藝術、任何人都是藝術家的“藝術史終結”的歷史時期，無論你是生活在紐約、倫敦、東京或北京的藝術家所面臨的問題都是一樣的——我們還能夠做什么？2010年我共制作了三件作品——“安息”、“絕對秩序”和“龍卷風”（圖1-3），這些作品使用的都是廢棄的塑料瓶，在這里我感興趣的是材料本身，因為在中國“廢棄的塑料瓶”已經達到了無所不在、隨手可得的泛濫狀態，加上塑料瓶上的商標，我把它們稱為“National Material”（國家材料），我使用這些材料，希望表達明確的具有中國今天特征的當代藝術。應該說“藝術家的創作是自由的”的說法并不準確，因為藝術家的作品所產生的意義還受到很多的外部的制約，其中包括了歷史和環境。60年代的安迪?沃霍的作品使用的是圖片復制術，因為當時在世界范圍內紐約的都市現代化發展的最快，商業廣告的需要和泛濫使得廣告復制成為紐約的“特色”，所以安迪的作品產生及其意義是符合了歷史必然，就如同和他處于同時期德國的博伊斯，各自作品的意義都產生于那個特定的地理位置和時間點，他們之間是不可以置換的。

我的“龍卷風”作品似乎與貧窮和波普藝術都有一定的關系，或者可以說是把這兩個完全不同的藝術風格融合在一起，作品使用的都是隨手可得的廢棄現成品，而且這些現成品是不加以任何加工的直接使用（只是清洗），所以作品材料很受貧窮藝術作品的影響。另外，因為使用的塑料瓶都產自中國，從造型到產品包裝的印刷物都體現了具有中國特色的“波普”印記，作品中這些塑料瓶從大到小的排列所產生的“抽象美”與色彩鮮艷的塑料瓶所具有的波普品性相結合，這符合中國在三十年的時間里保持一個“廉價世界工廠”的全部角色特征。

在這里我使用過去已經有的觀念而不羞愧，因為，在什么都可以是藝術、任何人都是藝術家的“藝術史終結”的歷史時期，我的藝術觀念是“再融合”——我們可以使用過去已經創造的任何觀念，使之再融合進具體的歷史時期、問題和感情，因此我的“龍卷風”作品即不是貧窮藝術也不是波普藝術，而表達了一個中國特有的意義——新廉價物質主義。

王智遠 2011年5月6日

（說明：新廉價物質主義——以低廉的工資、低廉的資源、低廉的物質享受極其低廉的沒有道德的世俗社會，這些都建立在普遍低廉的物質基礎上。新——乃人類從來沒有發生過。）

Artist statement:

After the work Thrown to the Wind was displayed at the White Rabbit Gallery in Sydney (please see the image above), almost all the comments on interviews and critical articles are related mainly to its implication in environment protection and ecology. Due to such a larger scale of population in mainland China, if every Chinese intended to adopt the American way of living, it might be a disaster in ecology. An example will be the wasted plastic bottles thrown away by us on a daily basis. Although I have used the wasted plastic bottles available everywhere in mainland China as the media for my work Thrown to the Wind, its implication is not solely meant to be environment protection. If to see the three pieces of my work created in the year of 2010, my interest in creating those work could be seen as of the relationship between media and environment, an exploration for a media best expressing my feeling today.

Today we live in a time so titled “After the end of art history” that everything could be art, and everyone could be an artist. No matter where to live, in New York, London, Tokyo or Beijing, we as artists face the same issue – what else we can do in terms of making art? In the year of 2010 in Beijing, I created all the three pieces of work titled Rest in Peace, Absolute Order and Thrown to the Wind (see attached the images). All the materials used to make the work are wasted plastic bottles. Hereby what I am interested most is the material itself. The “wasted plastic bottles” in mainland China is available everywhere together with the trade marks being printed on the bottles, which are entitled by myself as “National Materials”. I have used all these materials hopefully to express what contemporary art is clearly meant to be in relation to China’s context. It is not accurate to say that “artistic creativity is liberal” due to many external elements constraining the meaning of birth for an artist’s work, which include historical and environmental aspects. In the 1960s, what Andy Warhol has used in his work is photocopy. It was the time when urban development in New York experienced the fastest growth than any other parts of the world, a great demand and expansion of commercial ads has made advertising photocopy “unique” in New York. Thus it was a historical necessity for the birth of Andy Warhol’s works and their meaning. Just as of Joseph Beuys from the same time in Germany, his work’s meaning also originated from a geographic location and timing in particular. Both of their works could not be substituted from one the other.

My work Thrown to the Wind seems to evoke a certain relationship both with Arte Povera and Pop Art, in other words, to mix up two diverse styles into one. The wasted ready-mades used in the work are handy here and there and furthermore, all those ready-mades are used directly without being remade (only being cleaned by water). Therefore, the works have been very much influenced by Arte Povera in terms of the materials used. Besides, all the plastic bottles originated in China, their shaping and packaging are all marked with a unique Chinese “Pop Art”. The works intend to combine both the “abstract beauty” out of those plastic bottles being seated in different rows from bigger to smaller sizes and the characteristics of Pop Art brought up by the bottles in rich colours. This is coherent with all the characteristics of “a world manufacturer for something cheaper” that mainland China has kept in its development of the past three decades.

Hereby I am not shamed to have used the already existed concepts in my work, since we live in a time of “Art History after Modernism” when anything could be art and anyone could be an artist. My own art concept is to “remix” -- we might appropriate any concept already made and remix the concept with any historical period, issue and emotion in particular. Thus, my work Thrown to the Wind is neither related to Arte Povera nor to Pop Art, but intends to express a meaning particular to China – new cheap materialism.

Wang Zhiyuan 6th May, 2011

(N.B; New cheap materialism is defined as of living in a rustic society without morality, everyone enjoys something physical at a very cheap rate provided that the salary, resources and all others concerned at a very lower level. All those are built up on the physical basis of cheapness in popularity. The New here is meant to have never happened in the history of human beings.)