Southern Weekly, November 7 2013
Ink Paintings Cannot Be Always About Radish or Chinese Cabbage
Reporter: Li Hongyu
Illustration of picture:
Ink painting Spring Herald No.3 by Zhu Wei
Ten years ago Zhu Wei created his Spring Herald, in which with its white ropes hooping round a bold-headed man's head, a white mask bulging on his face. In the spring of 2003, this kind of pit-snout-shape masks in the painting could be seen everywhere in the whole Beijing city. Today we can get new meaning from it, although it's still the same painting.
On November 3rd 2013, after heavy smog lasting for two days in Beijing, the sky returned blue finally because of a small north wind. Painter Zhu Wei's solo exhibition opened at Today Art Museum in Beijing on the same day. Ten years ago Zhu Wei created his Spring Herald, which should be his self portrait, in which is a half-length profile of a bold-headed man, with a white mask bulging on his face, and two white ropes hooping round his head. At the bottom of the painting, there is a branch of peach blossoms stretching out and shining its colors. In the spring of 2003, this kind of pit-snout-shape masks in the painting could be seen everywhere in the whole Beijing city. Today we can get new meaning from it, although it's still the same painting.
Utopia No.46 was painted in 2004, with a background of red flags, tassels and bonsai, a middle ground of rows of people who bury themselves into a meeting, eyes narrowed, seemingly asleep, and a foreground of part of two gorgeous flower baskets.
The brushwork of the peach blossoms in Spring Herald was derived from a fan painted by an unidentified painter in the Southern Song Dynasty, and the baskets in Utopia series are adopted directly from The Flower Basket by Li Song of the Southern Song. Zhu Wei loves to deploy the materials from traditional gongbi paintings (meticulous painting) into a contemporary scene. He worships the traditional painting techniques: "Fan Kuan of the Song Dynasty, Shi Tao and Ba Da of the late Ming and early Qing Dynasty are my frames of reference, and objects that I want to challenge and surpass." But he never paints landscapes, flowers and birds, figures in traditional patterns which many ink painters embrace today setting aside any characteristics of the times. Zhu Wei believes if he uses the traditional techniques to record his contemporary life, experiences and feelings, then the tradition can be really alive.
And Thus How Boring the Meeting Is
Paintings being showed in this exhibition were created from 1988 to 2013. Zhu Wei was born in a military family. In 1982 at the age of 16, he enlisted in the People's Liberation Army, and three years later, he was admitted by the PLA Art Academy to study ink painting. The training was both rigorous and tedious. One exercise was to practice drawing lines and circles with a rolled up paper tube. The tip of the tube had to be inked just so, and the arm had to be suspended above the paper. Hours of drawing like this drove some young minds to distraction, but if you stuck with it, then the discipline took hold and eventually provided precision, deftness of touch, patience, and a sense of pride.
In Zhu Wei' paintings army men and officials often can be seen, as well as those boring meetings in some solemn conference halls. Chinese are very familiar with the meeting atmosphere in his Utopia series, in which the painter ridiculed it with small details: no matter male or female on the rostrum were all wearing earrings or ear studs, a male cadre even wearing a low lip stud. In 1989, Zhu Wei graduated from the PLA Art Academy, but he didn't come back to the army as required. In the next year, he enrolled in the Beijing Film Academy.
In 1993, Zhu Wei brought his works to an art exhibition in Guangzhou, where he was found by an American who opened a gallery in Hong Kong. This encounter led to a 12-year sole agent contract between the artist and the Plum Blossoms Gallery. Although what he painted was ink and wash, price of his works was more or less the same with some contemporary oil paintings by such as Fang Lijun in the Western market, which "made him rich" early. Comparing with most ink painters, Zhu Wei is totally different. He is a professional painter not belonging to any unit, association, or institution - he made a living by painting and selling paintings.
James Cahill, the former professor of art history at the University of California, Berkeley, wrote a book named How Artists Lived and Worked in Traditional China, in which the writer told us a true story. In Song Dynasty, there was a collector who likes a painter's work very much. Windy or rainy, he went to the hills in front of the village the painter lived every day, or climbed up to a tree in the village, to observe whether the chimney of the painter's house was smoking. If it wasn't smoking, it meant the painter ran out of food, so that he could bring food, good papers and ink, to visit the painter for asking for his painting. Zhu Wei likes this kind of "customer relationship" -- artists should survive with his works. "How many famous contemporary artists are there relying on China national academy or institute today? It's an important progress or return. Likewise, for sports games, the national team is no longer the only resource of the athletes such as Li Na who win the glory for her motherland. As in Europe or U.S., when sport games approaches, some active athletes were found from the streets, and sent out to the games. They will win several gold medals home immediately. It proves that a nation has higher sports level and better national physical quality, which is also the original intention of a sport competition."
But he is not keen on the market. When a journalist asked him about the market "blowout" for a certain kind of painting, he went straight to the heart of the matter by pointing out how ignorant and insensible to extend the industry term to describe the market, "It's a disaster. This word is frightening to drilling workers, and freak out their wives and children."
Why Cannot Ink Painting Be About Rock 'n' Roll?
"Chinese really haven't lived a good life for hundreds of years and sometimes even could not find the basic safety. Thus people began to doubt everything around them including our cultures. Ink paintings suffered two big disasters in the latest one hundred years: one is the May 4th Movement which denied our own cultures including ink paintings, the arranged marriage, the imperial examination system, and exorcism; the other is the traditional Chinese painting revolution after liberation, which introduced sketch and the laws of perspective into ink paintings." Zhu Wei said, "It’s almost thirty years since I started drawing ink and wash painting and all my materials and techniques come from tradition. I never left tradition yet what I depicted are peoples and things which are in progress today, namely the contemporary subjects we normally refer to. Therefore, using the past to serve the present is the idea and clue in my ink and wash painting."
Zhu Wei's paintings are never lack of the signs of the times. In his early works he inscribed the lyrics of songs Resolutions, Speculators, This Space written by Cui Jian on his paintings; he even signed his pager number with calligraphy on one of his Pictures of the Strikingly Bizarre series. He also used his seals "to serve the present" by stamping seven to eight leisure seals as well as personal name seal on his paintings. When internet became popular he built his official website, and imprinted it on his works; another example was his "Yu Shi Ju Jin" seal, which means "keep up with the times". "There was no enough time for me to carve some other seals such as 'Yi Ren Wei Ben (people-oriented)'. 'Yu Shi Ju Jin' is easier for kids to understand and won't astonish them. Deriving from I Ching - The Book of Changes this phrase had been a self-motivation which people kept in mind to encourage themselves in the past, while today people just exercise it in mouth." Zhu Wei said.
Zhu Wei inscribed Cui Jian's lyrics because he likes Rock 'n' Roll. In 1995 Cui Jian invited him to create the massive 19 by 10 meter backdrop which Cui Jian used for all the band’s performances at that time, of which he is particularly proud. "Nothing could have pleased Zhu Wei more than Cui Jian telling him that his paintings 'had music in them'.” Art curator Karen Smith said.
"Many people think there is no connection between ink painting and Rock 'n' Roll, there is no connection between ink painting and anything contemporary, and I think ink paintings cannot always be about radish or Chinese cabbage. Things should be changed. In some ink paintings you cannot see any characteristics of an era, which is pathetic, because what they paint is all the same, and boring." Zhu Wei said.
Wipe off the Dusts and Rusts
The white eyes, which are always staring upward in Zhu Wei's paintings, reveal his fond of Bada Shanren. And in his painting Sweet Life No.21, Zhu Wei even juxtaposed his white eyes human figure with the source of those white eyes, which are some of Bada Shanren's fishes.
In the painting series Vernal Equinox created in 2008, Zhu Wei placed several small figures on his painting, whose clothes, hair and faces are clean, while their clothes are not the ancient Chinese robes any more, with their hands folded into sleeves or tucked into pockets, their eyes staring upward at sky, and bright-colored peach flowers and leaves levitated amid these small figures as if just falling from the sky. "Looking upward with folding arms" is a typical pose Zhu Wei persists, and has been one of his personal symbols in the meaning of painting. If we think about it we will understand it's a precise summarization of the social habits in our reality. Of politics, economics, culture, or personal life, spring is the symbolic season which is the new China's favorite; these rootless peach blossoms are reporting the spring, but these urbane gentlemen's faces are indifferent as usual as if they have been accustomed to the report.
The German sinologist Michael Kahn-Ackermann said, "The essence of ink paintings lies in freehand brushwork, which is an expression of inner experiences of self, nature, society and reality. Accumulating this kind of experiences is a painful process, but one has to cultivate himself in Chinese traditional art, without which, one cannot hand-paint one's idea freely."
Another Zhu Wei's symbol is he antiques the paper by brushing on a mustard-colored wash before he starts to paint. The paper being treated lies on a wooden grid or nubby carpet which creates background patterns of an antique look, as if inviting you to travel to hundreds years later, to watch the painting and grasp the temperament and characteristics of where we are today. In an essay Zhu Wei wrote for an art magazine he ridiculed the era he is in: "It looks like a transforming period but in fact it's a stagnating, circling-in-the-same-spot period."
Similar clues can be found in his two pieces of "transboundary" sculptures that created during the 50 anniversary of new China. China Diary - Star is a huge five-pointed star with a looking of ancient bronze and a motif of Tao-Tie mask.
China China is two huge figures wearing Mao suits, standing respectfully, lifting up their heads, leaning forward their bodies, expressing a strong feeling of moving forward. With their surface covered by a layer of sands and dusts, the bronze sculptures look like newly unearthed and being displayed in a history museum. The IBM in US collected this piece. When installing it in the hall of IBM building in New York, because the workers had no idea that the dusts and rusts are part of the artwork, they wiped off all of them and made the sculpture clean as a pin.
In 2010 Zhu Wei took out the red flags from the background of his Utopia series and started to paint them independently in a way of abstract, and the texture in those paintings reminds us the focus-out method created by German contemporary master Richter. However, what Zhu Wei is looking for is the outlining methods of the drapes of ancient clothes such as "Cao’s clothes rising from the water” and "Wu’s clothes carrying the wind". "It's close to orchid leaf outlining, the representative works of which are Celestial King Delivering a Son and The Eighty-seven Immortals. Modern people dress conveniently so this kind of outlining technique is not fit for them." Zhu Wei said. He has seen some new fine brushwork made during the period of Cultural Revolution, "for example, when they are drawing the subjects of somebody inspecting some hydraulic construction site, somebody stopping the frightened horse, etc., the painters combined wire outlining and orchid leaf outlining, which made the figures excessively elegant and unsteady, as if they cannot do any labour work, and they are just a group of peasants passing by the construction site in a sleepwalking state. And the cadre who is inspecting the site is like an immortal descended to the earth, coming with clouds and fogs, staying for a short while, leaving in a minute. It's not based on reality."
Although the traditional outlining methods of clothes are rarely used in modern environment and motifs, "I found the red flag series is a unique symbol of our contemporary reality and living conditions. We have a so-called five thousand years of history, but until the current moment, there never was a dynasty or time as now that we are facing a same color and same image which so overwhelmingly affects millions of families and several generations."
《南方周末》二零一三年十一月七日
水墨画不能老跟萝卜白菜有关
南方周末记者 李宏宇
图片说明：
水墨《报春图三号》
朱伟十年前的作品《报春图》，白绳箍向光头男人脑后，脸上向前撅着白色口罩。2003年春，整个北京城都像画中人一样戴着“猪鼻子口罩”。画还是那幅，放在今天却又让人读出新意思来。 （朱伟/图）
2013年11月3日，北京接连两天严重的雾霾之后，天空因为刮起小北风变得湛蓝，画家朱伟的水墨画个人展览在北京今日美术馆揭幕。十年前朱伟画过一张《报春图》，一个光头男人的侧面半身像，应该是他的自画像，两道白绳箍向脑后，脸上向前撅着白色口罩。画面底部伸出一枝“灼灼其华”的桃花。2003年春天，整个北京城都像画里的人一样戴着“猪鼻子口罩”。画还是那一幅，放在今天却又让人读出新意思来。
《乌托邦四十六号》绘于2004年，后景是红旗、流苏、盆栽，中景是一排排埋着头眼睛眯成缝不知是否快要睡着的人，手上正记着会议内容，前景是两只花篮的华丽局部。
《报春图》里桃花的画法来自南宋佚名扇面，“乌托邦”系列里的花篮则直接师法南宋画家李嵩的花篮图。朱伟非常喜欢把传统工笔画的素材配置到当代气息的场景里。技法上他是崇古的：“宋代的范宽、明末清初的石涛和八大山人是我的参照系，也是我较劲和超越的对象。”但他从来不画传统样式的山水、花鸟、人物画，也就是今天大量水墨画家创作的那种看不出作于什么年代的作品。他认为用传统技法记录自己当下的生活、经验、感觉，才能让传统真正活起来。
可见开会有多闷
展览中画作的创作时间从1988年直到2013年。出身军人家庭的朱伟1982年16岁入伍，3年后被招入解放军艺术学院学习国画。学校训练严苛又乏味，其中一项是用纸卷蘸上墨汁当笔，悬肘画直线和圆圈，连续几个小时。要年轻人不分心非常艰难，可一旦坚持下来，就会掌握方法，最终收获精细灵动的笔触、耐心以及自豪感。
朱伟笔下常常出现军人和官员，还有那些庄严会场上的沉闷会议。后来在“乌托邦”系列那种中国人再熟悉不过的会场氛围当中，他也玩一点细微的调侃，主席台上不论男女，耳垂上都挂了耳环或耳钉，一个男干部甚至穿着下唇钉。1989年，朱伟从解放军艺术学院毕业，没有按规定回到部队，而是在第二年考了北京电影学院。
1993年朱伟带着自己的作品去广州参加画展，被在香港开画廊的美国人看中，与香港万玉堂画廊一次签下12年独家代理约。他的画虽是水墨，那时在西方市场却与方力钧等人的当代油画价格相仿，这使他很早“致富”。与眼下绝大多数水墨画家不同，朱伟是职业画家，没有单位，不在任何协会、机构，只靠卖画生活。
加州伯克利大学艺术史教授高居翰的《画家生涯》一书，讲传统中国画家的生活与工作，里边有个故事：宋时一个藏家喜欢一个画家的作品，无论刮风下雨，每天都到村口对面山坡上或爬到村里树上，看画家房上的烟囱是否冒烟；如果不冒烟，说明画家这两天断粮了，他便带着粮食和好纸好墨前去，以求得到画家的作品。朱伟喜欢这样的“客户关系”——艺术家应该靠作品生存：“大家现在能叫上名来的当代艺术家，有几个是靠国家的画院、研究院养的？这是一次重大的进步或者回归。就像体育比赛，为国争光的运动员比如李娜这样的不再是只从国家队出了，跟欧美国家一样，比赛临近，随便街上找几个好动的，派出去立马就能拿回几个金牌来，这说明了一个国家体育水平全民身体素质整体比较高，这才是体育比赛的初衷。”
但他并不热衷于市场，有媒体跟他谈某一类别绘画作品的市场行情“井喷”，他一针见血地点出这个行业术语被引申到市场领域泛滥使用，背后的某种无知和麻木：“那是灾难。钻井工人就怕这事儿，家里老婆孩子一听这词儿魂都没了。”
水墨怎么不能跟摇滚有关？
“中国人最近几百年来真没过过多少好日子，甚至有时连安全感都找不到，人们开始怀疑身边的一切，包括文化。水墨画百年来两大劫难：一是五四运动否定自己的文化，包括水墨画、包办婚姻、科举制度、跳大神；另一次就是解放后的国画革命，把素描、透视原理带进水墨画。”朱伟说，“我画水墨快三十年，使用的材料、技法全部从传统来，我一直没有脱离开传统，但我描绘的是当下发生的人和事，是正在进行时。古为今用是我画水墨画的理念和创作脉络。”
时间标记在朱伟的画作中从来不缺。早期作品中他在落款时题写崔健的歌词，《解决》、《投机分子》、《这儿的空间》；“新二刻拍案惊奇”系列中的一幅，他甚至把自己当时的呼机号也写上了。钤印也被朱伟拿来“古为今用”，名字印之外，他的画面上常有七八方钤印。当互联网普及，画家个人网站建成，他开始在作品上使用网址印鉴；2001年左右他开始使用“与时俱进”印章。“后来还有‘以人为本’等等没来得及刻。与时俱进这词儿不至于让孩子们惊呆了，《易经》里就有，以前是人们记在心里激励自己用，现在是放在嘴皮子上练着玩儿。”朱伟说。
落款写崔健歌词是因为朱伟喜欢摇滚。1995年崔健请朱伟为他制作了19米×10米的巨型舞台背景幕，在自己的多场演出使用，这使朱伟殊为骄傲。“没有什么能比崔健说‘你的画里有音乐’更让朱伟得意的了。”艺术评论家凯伦·史密斯说。
“很多人觉得水墨画跟摇滚没关系，水墨与当代东西根本不合。我觉得水墨画不能老跟萝卜白菜有关，得发生改变。有的水墨画看不出是哪个年代的，这就很可悲了，因为画的东西都一样，没意思。”朱伟说。
尘土锈迹，擦掉擦掉
画中人物的眼神最直接体现朱伟对八大山人的喜爱。他的人物总是向上翻着白眼，在《甜蜜的生活二十一号》当中，朱伟把白眼的源头跟白眼的人物画在一起，是几条“八大”的鱼。
在2008年的《开春图》系列，朱伟在画面上排列着一个个小人儿，衣裳头发面孔都干净。衣裳已不是古时的宽袍大袖，但他们还是两手抄进袖筒，或者揣进裤兜，两眼向天翻出一大片白。鲜艳的桃花似从天降，漂浮在小人儿之间。袖手望天是朱伟逮住不放使劲描摹的人物态度，在绘画意义上它成为朱伟的个人符号之一，稍稍琢磨就明白那是对现实中社会习性的准确概括。无论在政治、经济、文化还是个人生活，春天都是新中国喜爱使用的季节象征；没有来由的桃花报告着春意，然而文质彬彬的体面人表情淡漠，似乎早已见惯不惊。
德国汉学家米歇尔·康·阿克曼说：“水墨画的本质是写意。写意是一种内在经验表达方式，对自我、对自然、对社会、对现实的经验。积累这种经验是非常艰苦的过程，中国传统艺术当中叫修养，你没有这种修养，没法把这个‘意’写下来。”
朱伟的另一个标志是绘画之前，先在纸上刷棕黄颜色做旧。刷的时候下边垫上带格纹的木板、纸板或地毯。这个费工夫的程序造出的底纹，使画面呈现出古董似的外观。像是邀请你站到三五百年开外，再来打量画面上那个年代的气质和属性。朱伟在给艺术杂志写的杂文专栏里调侃过自己的这个年代：“看上去是社会转型期，但实际上停滞不前，是原地转圈儿时期。”
“跨界”作于新中国成立50周年的两件雕塑也有类似的举动。《中国日记“星”》就是一只青铜外观的大五角星，但通体饕餮纹。
《中国 中国》，两个庞大的人身着中山装，站姿毕恭毕敬，双肩收紧，仰着头，身体前倾，表达出强烈的前进欲望。铜像表面涂着砂砾和尘土，使它们看上去是新近出土，陈列在历史博物馆里。这件雕塑被美国IBM公司收藏，在纽约IBM大厦中庭安装时，工人不知道这些尘土锈迹是雕塑的一部分，结果把雕塑擦洗得干干净净。
2010年朱伟把“乌托邦”系列当中作为背景的红旗抽取出来，画成抽象意味的特写，甚至有德国当代绘画大师里希特“焦点不实”的质感。他寻找的是“曹衣出水，吴带当风”的衣纹线描技法，“接近兰叶描，代表作《送子天王图》、《八十七神仙卷》。现代人轻装简行这种技法很难再派上用场。”朱伟见过“文革”期间一些推陈出新的工笔画作品，“比如某某视察某某水利工地，某某某拦惊马等等，用铁线加兰叶描画出来，人物都显得过于飘逸，站不稳，不像在干活，倒像是一群农民集体梦游路过工地。领袖视察也像是神仙下凡，吞云吐雾待会就走，总之难接地气。”
现代的环境和题材，用得上传统衣纹表现技法的地方确实很少了。“红旗系列是真正找到了当代现实生活环境中所特有的符号，我们号称有五千多年的历史，从当下这一秒钟往前推，任何一个朝代和任何一个时间点，人们从未有幸赶上这么铺天盖地的同一颜色和造型，这种颜色和造型构成的符号直指人心影响千家万户，波及几代人。” |
