拾年者 ——以“仚”字立堂
过去的十年，对艺术寄托的理想在时间和现实语境的锤炼中，使我深入体会当代艺术所发生的实质，也清晰的认识到当代艺术的重要性和未来性。从事艺术行业十年，初心未酬，艺术收藏算是对初心的守持，高洁处以“仚”字立堂，“仚”引申为人立于山巅举指高引，饱有前行的意志。这一切均源于中国当代艺术的方兴未艾和对东方热土的深沉挚爱。2021 年“仚東堂” 正式在北京成立，作为独立的艺术项目空间和收藏空间，立足本土当代艺术发展，致力于中西方当代艺术的交流与推广。
过去的十年，在守望艺术中与诸位友人结下深厚的友谊，也见证了世界范围内新一代艺术家的崛起。仚東堂的开幕展跨越世纪与国度，共展出阿尔.赫尔德 Al Held 、崔云峰、董大为、胡玛.芭芭 Huma Bhabha、梁硕、洛伊.霍洛韦尔 Loie Hollowell、唐永祥、杨永利、于吉、闫冰，共十位艺术家的艺术佳作。仚東堂开幕展既是理想与现实间的唱酬，也是面向未来的开始。
Over the past decade, I have placed ideals in art and refined them over time and in the context of reality, which allowed me to gain a more profound understanding of the essence of contemporary art and its vital importance and futurity. With more than one decade of engagement in the art industry, my initial intention has not yet been fulfilled. Collecting art collection is considered a way of preserving my initial intent. To establish the hall with "immortality" is a term derived from the imagery of a person standing on top of a mountain and raising his finger to lead the way, who shows determination to move forward. These endeavors trace back to the emerging contemporary art in China and my deep passion for the land of the East. In 2021, "Xian Dong Tang" is officially established in Beijing as an independent art space that presents projects and art collections rooted in the development of local contemporary art and dedicated to exchanging and promoting Chinese and Western art practices.Over the last decade, we have formed tight friendships with friends and colleagues in the field and witnessed the rise of a new generation of artists from around the world. The inaugural exhibition at The East Hall spans centuries and nations, featuring ten artists including Al Held, Cui Yunfeng, Dong Dawei, Huma Bhabha, Liang Shuo, and Loie Hollowell, Tang Yongxiang, Yang Yongli, Yu Ji, and Yan Bing. The opening of this exhibition is considered a rendezvous between the ideal and the realities, and as a beginning for the future.
20 世纪 50、60 年代，Al Held (1928–2005) 被纽约艺术界公认“最有争议和最具影响力的画家之一”，他是硬边抽象艺术(Hard-edged Abstraction)的先驱，是推动美国抽象艺术表达的前行者。此次展出 Al Held 于 1989 年创作的油彩作品《Cygnus I》，是他艺术生涯最后阶段的佳作，其创作灵感源自于罗马文艺复兴时期的壁画遗产，结合他“颜料画”时期的色块张力和“黑白绘画”时期的空间视错觉，使画面呈现出明亮的几何空间，有着诗意的深景感。Al Held 于 2005 年逝世，终其一生探索研究抽象绘画的边界语言，其艺术作品的先验性，对于当代的抽象艺术实践者来说仍然言之有物。
In the 1950s and 1960s, Al Held (1928-2005) was recognized by the New York art world as "one of the most controversial and influential painters," a pioneer of hard-edged abstraction, and a pioneer in advancing the expression of abstract art in the United States. He was a pioneer of hard-edged abstraction heralded the American abstract expressionism. This exhibition presents Al Held's 1989 oil painting Cygnus I, a masterpiece from the final phase of his career, inspired by the legacy of Renaissance frescoes in Rome. The artist integrated the tensions from the color blocks of his "pigment painting" period with the spatial illusion of his "black and white painting" period. "Al Held, who died in 2005, spent his life exploring and researching the peripheral language of abstract painting, and the a priori nature of his artworks is still relevant to contemporary practitioners of abstract art.
在多年的艺术实践中，艺术家崔云峰探索出“色彩光域”的绘画理念，与“色域绘画”类似，在大面积使用颜色，较少强调笔触和绘画的具体行动，颜色从描述客观物象的作用中解放出来，成为艺术家表达的本身。 “色彩光域”是在硬边、单色、光效应的共同作用下，使画面色彩如发光体般形成彼此的场域，在富有形式美感的同时，有视觉致幻的效果，艺术家无疑是色彩的魔术师。与云峰相识十多年，他的艺术观念和不断演进的艺术实践让我感同身受，此次开幕展特别展出他的绘画新作《无题-2021》，期待与更多的观众分享崔云峰的艺术作品，加深对其艺术创作的理解。
In his many years of art practice, artist Cui Yunfeng has explored the concept of "optical color field” painting, which is similar to color field painting. Colors are applied over a large area on canvas with less emphasis on brushstrokes and specific actions of painting. Hence, the colors are freed from describing objective realities and become the artist's expression. The "optical color field" is a combination of hard edges, monochromatic colors, and light effects, where the colors of the picture form a field that illuminates each other. They are rich informal aesthetics while generating visual illusions. I have known Yunfeng for more than ten years, sharing his artistic concept and evolving artistic practice. This opening exhibition presents his new painting Untitled-2021. By sharing Cui Yunfeng's masterpieces, I hope to share my appreciation of his artistic creation with a broader audience.
观念先行与艺术史自觉一直是董大为艺术创作所秉承的，中国古代绘画中文士大夫笔墨野逸非常重要的绘画技巧便是笔墨晕染，董大为《水织纹》 (纸上马克笔)系列作品的创作与传统绘画保持着观念上的平衡，他赋予”笔墨晕染”新的艺术观念。艺术家不在直接介入绘画中的情感功用，是材料作为主体物理性的互为作用，自然生成标准量化的机体，画面色彩微妙的变化在理性、克制的结构关系中蕴含视觉的能量点。《水织纹》作品中色彩的“晕染”所呈现出的“色彩机体”不同于 Gerhard Richter“色谱系列”指向的波普艺术(PopArt)的新方向，艺术家背对传统意义上的绘画认知，主动告别视觉层面上的“再现”或“表现”，甚至弱化了文化属性。于是，一种“无关性”凸显出了艺术纯粹性的同时，使得作品的指向回归到了艺术家本体。没有风格或许能产生风格，回避情感恰好可以激发情感，董大为的艺术实践为当代绘画拓展出观念性视野。
Dong Dawei’s art practice has been primarily driven by conceptual art and informed by Chinese and Western art history. For example, ink wash techniques have been an essential technique of Chinese literati and officials in ancient Chinese painting. Dong Dawei's Weave Ripple (marker on paper) series maintains a conceptual balance with a traditional painting by providing "ink wash" with a new conceptual dimension. The artist does not directly intervene in the emotional impact of an image but rather the physical interaction of the material as its subject, which naturally generates a standardized and quantifiable body. The subtle changes of color in the picture contain visual energy, suggesting a rational and restrained structural relationship. The "body of color" presented by the "permeation" of colors in Weave Ripple is different from the new direction of PopArt pointed by Gerhard Richter's "Chromatography Series." The artist turns his back on the traditional perception of painting, resolutely leaving the visual aspect of "reproduction" or "representation" even undermining their cultural attributes. Thus, a kind of "irrelevance" highlights the purity of art and restores the artworks to the artist’s practice. The absence of style may produce style, and the avoidance of emotion can stimulate emotion. Dong Dawei's artistic practice expands the conceptual vision for contemporary painting.
Huma Bhabha 的雕塑作品的美感是以爱为起源，与以精妙柔软为媒介相异，在她的作品中，有一种不可预知的直觉力量为指引，展开与造物之间的对话。哲学家 Edmund Burke(1729—1797)在《关于崇高与美的两种观念的起源之哲学研究》中言：“凡是能以某种方式适宜于引起痛苦和危险的观念的事物，即凡是能以某种方式令人恐怖的，或者与恐怖的对象有关的，或是以类似恐怖的方式发挥作用的事物，就是崇高的来源”。观看 Huma Bhabha 作品能使我们正视其内心的“惊惧”，这种“惊惧”是具悲剧氛围的肃穆感所引起的哀愁与崇敬，并促使我们作出关于自然、战争和人类文明的古老过去和遥远未来的大规模调解。此次展出 Huma Bhabha 一组极为精彩的肖像作品《Untitled (I- IV)》，这组怪诞、神情忧郁的肖像绘画，极具她艺术创作的典型性。
The aesthetics of Huma Bhabha's sculptures find their origin in love, as opposed to the subtle softness of the medium. In her works, an unpredictable intuition leads the artist’s dialogue throughout her practice. The philosopher Edmund Burke (1729-1797), states in Philosophical Studies on the Origin of the Two Concepts of the Sublime and the Beautiful, "That which appropriates the idea of causing pain and danger, in other words, what is horrifying, or related to the object of horror, functioning in a horror-like manner, is the source of the sublime.” Looking at Huma Bhabha's work allows us to confront the "fear" within us, the sorrow and reverence caused by the solemnity of a tragic atmosphere and prompts us to make a general reconciliation with the ancient past and distant future nature, war, and human civilization. Huma Bhabha's brilliant portrait Untitled (I-IV) is a group of grotesque, melancholy portraits that are typical of her artistic production.
Loie Hollowell
1983 年生于美国一个艺术世家，作为纽约目前最受追捧的艺术家之一，她的绘画被《纽约时报》描述为“抽象的身体风景”。2009 年，她因身孕而重新审视自己的身体，以一种自我意识觉醒的女性主义视角开启了新的艺术创作，身体与性所承载的意义也因此被重新发掘，这也使得她的作品在当代西方极富话题性。Loie Hollowell 艺术创作背后有着充分的艺术史参考，艺评家常常把她与女性主义艺术家 Georgia O’Keeffe、Judy Chicago 的艺术创造联系在一起，而 Loie Hollowell 这一身体景观与精神隐喻性图示，则受到已故的印度“新坦多罗”现代艺术运动之父古拉姆·拉苏·桑托什 (Gulam Rasool Santosh)神秘主义的影响，Gulam Rasool Santosh 的珠宝用色和工整的抽象图形，是 Loie Hollowell 用光轮和双曲线进行图像创作的开端。而今，Loie Hollowell 把身体与精神宇宙紧密的联系在一起，这也使她的艺术语言越来越成熟。
Loie Hollowell was born in 1983 in the United States into an artistic family. As one of the most sought-after artists in New York, her paintings have been described by the New York Times as "abstract body landscapes.” In 2009, she re-examined her body due to her pregnancy and set out a new direction in her practice with a feminist perspective of self-awakening. She rediscovered the meaning of body and sexuality, resonating with current discourses in the West. Loie Hollowell's artworks draw references from art history. Many art critics have linked her to feminist artists such as Georgia O'Keeffe, Judy Chicago, and others. At the same time, Loie Hollowell's physical landscapes and spiritual metaphors are influenced by the mysticism of the late Gulam Rasool Santosh, the father of India's "Neo-Tantra" modern art movement. Gulam Rasool Santosh's jeweled colors and neat abstract shapes began Loie Hollowell's graphic work using the wheel of light and the fluid lines. Today, Loie Hollowell's intimate connection between the body and the spiritual universe has grown to maturity in her artistic language.
梁硕从自我独立的美学观念出发，以物质世界的现实语境为基础，在艺术探索上不断发掘出个体与周遭环境的感知关系，从他早期的“城市农民系列”到“物质练习”、“费特系列”再到 “渣系列”等，这种感知关系贯穿其艺术创作的不同阶段。此次展出梁硕“渣系列”作品《买后母蓝 No.6 》是一件陶瓷上色的雕塑作品，仅从物像上看，可追溯到中国古代道教兴起和佛教传入后的雕塑艺术，红墙、古松、卧虎合围出一处古意盎然的小景，同时又能把观者拉回到渣景诙谐的现实世界中，一种于古今间游走的感觉。这也正如梁硕所言:“《买后母蓝 No.6 》有点像彩钢蓝，是他多年游走中国各地印象深刻的渣景。造物、古今、叵测、空间，雕塑得转着看 “。梁硕的艺术创作有本源可溯，擅于以丰富和多维度的视角，在古今艺术观念的转换上辟出新路。
Starting from his independent aesthetic concept rooted in the realistic context of the material world, Liang Shuo has continuously explored the perceptual relationship between individuals and their surroundings in his artistic exploration. From his early "Urban Farmer Series" to "Material Exercise," "Fetter Series," and "Slag Series," this perceptual relationship runs through different phases of his art practice. For this exhibition, Liang Shuo’s Buy My Homeland No.6 from the "Jag series" is a colored ceramic sculpture, which can be traced back to the sculpture art of ancient China after the rise of Taoism and the introduction of Buddhism. Its red walls, old pines, and crouching tigers enclosing a miniature scene of ancient aesthetics. At the same time, the piece draws the viewer back to the real world of the witty jagged scene, offering a sense of wandering between the past and the present. This is also as Liang Shuo said: "Buy My Homeland is a bit like the blue steel rooftop, which is his impression of jagged scenery from his travels around China over the years. Creation, ancient and modern, the unfathomable, sculpture has to be looked at in rotations." Liang Shuo's art practice comes from an inherent place. The artist has been blazing new trails in transforming ancient and modern art concepts with a rich and multi-dimensional perspective.
艺术没有法则，绘画在被视作窄门艺术的同时，却在新时代走出丰富的活路来，具象绘画依然是这个时代的架上主流，去图像化则成为绘画与其所根基的物像进行象征与叙事可能的重新思考，并不脱离最为真实的物质世界的现实语境。唐永祥的绘画是依赖感性直觉的，图像只是他艺术创作的底衬和依托，在通过覆盖、重构图像的关系，反复消解甚至抽空底衬图像的同时，释放出丰富的不可预见性的感性边缘，这些感性边缘被他机敏地转换出新的形、色、结构关系，从而使画面从既有的感知经验和因果逻辑中跳脱出来，在形成个人风格语言的同时，图绘的表征背后则是新时代的绘画气息。
There are no rules to art practice. While painting is regarded as a narrow discipline, it has emerged with diverse and vital paths in the new era. Although figurative painting remains in the mainstream in the present, eliminating the pictorial component of a painting has become a possibility to rethink the symbolic and the narrative regarding the object-based image without detaching from the realistic context of the material world. Tang Yongxiang's paintings rely on sensual intuition, and the pictorial components only serve as the backdrop and support for his artistic creation. While repeatedly dissolving or emptying the backdrop of a painting by overlaying and reconstructing its pictorial relationship, Tang releases diverse and unpredictable sensual edges. He sensitively transforms them into new shapes, colors, and structural relationships, thus allowing the images to jump out from the set perceptual experience and causal logic. While the artist shaped a personal style and language, what lies behind the surface of the painted image is the atmosphere of a new era.
在朋友处闻得杨永利先生的陶艺作品，后见先生本人，并远赴他乡拜访其窑址。“万物作焉而不辞”，注定了世间纷繁的虚妄居多，能在当下这纷呈的流变中守得一份大繁至简的日常，想必其内省的身心充满了智慧。在杨永利先生的日常生活和陶艺创作中，亦充满着这样的智慧。先生的陶艺创作保持着与传统陶艺的功能性差别，作为心、眼、手的造化，其内里讲究的是学养和超凡的审美技艺，在溯源传统与思变，在与环境、古今、时代流行对话的同时， 作品在空间主义和象征性的表达上，充分体现出东方文人造物的哲学观和美学观念 。借用苏珊·桑塔格的《反对阐释》来讲，艺术不需要阐释，当然也不需要还原为内容，邀请观众以新的方式去寻找、感受和表达他们对杨永利陶艺作品《荷鲁斯眼中的阿努纳奇》的感受。
I heard about Mr. Yang Yongli's pottery works from a friend and later met him in person and visited his kiln site in his hometown. "All things are made but not resigned,” in other words, if one can keep a simple daily routine amid all the changes in the world, one must have a reflective mind and body full of wisdom. Yang is an artist who leads a simple daily life in the current changes, and his introspections are full of wisdom. His ceramics stays away from the functional aspect of this traditional medium. It is conceived as a practice of the mind, eye, and hands, which aims for aesthetic cultivation and sublime techniques. While tracing traditions and speculating change through dialogues with the environment, past and present, and the popular of the times, Yang’s works fully reflect the philosophical view and aesthetics of the oriental literati in the expression of spatiality and symbolism. Borrowing from Susan Sontag's “Against Interpretation," art does not need to be interpreted and certainly not reduced to content. This work invites the audience to discover, sense, and express their feelings about Yang Yongli's ceramic work Anunnaki in the Eyes of Horus in a new way.
在过去十年的艺术创作中，于吉着力于探索时间在瞬息万变的城市中所发挥的作用，她的作品令人联想到隽永的雕塑是由质量、质地，材料和形式构建而成的临时性景观。于吉擅长就地取材，因地制宜，利用特定场域和语境，创作出两种不同世界之间的边际空间——不同势力在其中分庭抗礼，意外偶然也在其中孕育滋生。“肉质的身体是一种有机体:它消耗、排泄、生育并追求 无数形式的欲望。从外部看，人体是一个复杂的、低效的、不可救药的欲望机器。虽然《石肉》的身体由混凝土浇铸而成，但它们触动了观众的触觉神经系统，因而给人以意想不到的感官享受。然而，它们并不耽于肉欲:生殖器的存在并非暗示性，而是神经地图上的另一个点。我感到自己的神经将自身投射到这些平滑的、被截断的身体的光滑的混凝土皮肤之上。——《于吉的艺术》摘录”
Over the last decade of her artistic practice, Yu Ji focused on exploring the notion of temporality in the ever-changing urban setting. Her evocative timeless sculptures engender temporary landscapes constructed with texture, material, and form. Yu Ji is keen on using materials from her immediate surroundings and adapting her work to specific sites and contexts, creating a liminal space between two different worlds - one in which various forces are divided and the other breeds chance and the unexpected. "The corporeal body is an organism: it consumes, excretes, reproduces, and pursues countless forms of desire. Seen from the outside, the human body is a complex, inefficient and irredeemable desire machine. Although the bodies in Stone Flesh are cast in concrete, they touch the viewer's tactile perception and thus provide an unexpected sensory pleasure. However, they do not delay carnal desires, although genitalia is often nonexistent but exists on a sensory map. I’ve projected my nerves onto the smooth concrete skin of these truncated bodies.” --Excerpt from The Art of Yu Ji
由于历史原因，“现实主义”一直占据着中国现代美术史的中心位置， 在写实和具象领域艺术家们不断创造出丰硕的成果。作为“80 后”艺术家，闫冰的绘画虽然也是具象写实的表达手法，却呈现出与以往迥然不同的气质和格局。土豆、蘑菇、苹果以及植物的局部等，这些日常之物在闫冰的笔下，其朴素的、内敛的、隐喻生命的视觉物感，蕴含精神性的一面。这是艺术家个体经验与当下生存世界关系深刻思考的结果，也是艺术家观看世界的角度、个人精神史、艺术观念的结果。油画作品《七个土豆 》是闫冰“土豆系列”创作最具代表性的作品，像是人类家庭成员群像的日常写照，有一种轻微仰视所带来的仪式感。
For historical reasons, "realism" has always occupied the central position in modern Chinese art history, and artists in the field of realism and figuration have continuously made fruitful creations. As a "post-80s" artist, although artist Yan Bing has adopted a figurative and realistic approach to work on canvas, his paintings present somewhat different temperaments and patterns from the past. Potatoes, mushrooms, apples, and partial plants, these everyday objects through Yan Bing's brush, embody a simple, introspective, metaphorical vitality that contains a spiritual aspect. This is the outcome of the artist's individual experience and profound thoughts from surviving the present world. They also reveal the artist’s angle of observation, personal spiritual history, and extraction of artistic concepts. This oil painting, Seven Potatoes, is the most representative work of Yan Bing's potato series, as an everyday portrait of family members, with a ritualistic sense of appreciation.
文 : 李战豪 Li Zhanhao
仚東堂
仚东堂2021年成立于北京，是一家独立的艺术项目空间和收藏空间，立足中国当代艺术的发展，致力于中西方当代艺术的交流与推广。
Xian Dong Tang（仚東堂）was founded in Beijing, 2021. As a independent space of art programs and contemporary art collections, Xian Dong Tang bases itself on the development of Chinesecontemporary art and will be devoted to the communication and promotion of Chinese and western contemporary art.