沉郁与风流 ——读彭斯的绘画/文：彭锋

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沉郁与风流

——读彭斯的绘画

  彭锋北京大学美学与美育研究中心教授，哲学家、美学家


与大多数青年艺术家为艺术界的潮起潮落所困扰不同，彭斯坚持走自己的路，并成功地创作出了一批广受欢迎的艺术作品。彭斯的作品为什么会赢得大家的喜欢呢？

Ⅰ

首先，彭斯的绘画?是美的。当代艺术界中，很少有人用“美”来评价艺术作品。这种趋势已经?统治了艺术界近一个世纪之久。在抽象绘画?大师纽曼看来，“现代艺术的动力就是摧毁美。”1 艺术哲学家丹托更加激进，认为“艺术从来就不是注定要以美为最终目的。”“至关重要的是，要将美学意义上的美与更广泛意义上的艺术卓越性区别开来，美学意义上的美可以与艺术卓越性毫无关系。”2  在这种敌视美的大背景下，彭斯反其道而行之，自觉地以“美”为目标，这种行为本身就具有挑战性。

但是，彭斯并不像某些波普艺术家那样，只是从策略上利用美。比如，在科马和梅??米德的“人民的选择”系列绘画?中，“美”并没有得到严肃的对待。大多数当代艺术家都喜欢采取“正反两可”策略，以期在作品的解读上造成巨大的张力。就像在维斯库姆（Morten Viskum）的“从不停止绘画?的手”中那样，用死人手画?出来的画?生动而优美，从而在生死之间形成张力。简单地说，如果是用活人的手画?画?，就要画?得像死人的手画?的那样；如果是用死人的手画?画?，就要画?得像活人的手画?的那样。这就是当代艺术家普遍采取的正反两可的策略。彭斯没有采取这种流行的当代策略。他只是正面地追求他心目中的美，就像过去那些老大师那样。

彭斯绘画?中体现的美，没有炫目的外观，相反它显得中正内敛，是一种发自心灵的精神之美，并且与中国传统文化发生了内在的关联。彭斯喜欢赵孟頫的字的中正平和，北宋山水的博大谨严，魏晋名士的风流超迈，屈原?宋玉的沉郁顿挫。彭斯作品所体现的美，不是当代的时尚之美，不是由比例造成的和谐之美，而是中国传统美学所推崇的隽永之美。

Ⅱ

由于与传统文化具有内在的关联，彭斯的绘画?显得很有文人气。文人气或者书卷气，是中国书画?理论中的一个重要概念。王国维关于“古雅”的论述，有助于我们理解这里的文人气或者书卷气。根据王国维的理解，古雅是艺术家由后天的学习熏陶所得到的一种品质，是艺术作品的“第二形式”或者“形式之美之形式之美”。3  换句话说，古雅是一种不同凡俗的气氛或意境，它只可感受而无法言传。鉴于它只可感受而无法言传，我们可以称之为感觉氛围。就这种氛围是可以直接感受到的而言，它接近杜夫海纳（Mikel Dufrenne）所说的“灿烂的感性”，就这种氛围是通过理论学习所得的而言，它接近丹托所说的“理论氛围”。总之，这里所说的文人气或者书卷气，气氛或者意境，是一种能够被感受到的文化气息。中国传统艺术非常推崇这种气息。彭斯的绘画?中就有这种气息。

Ⅲ

彭斯画?的是油画?，对欧洲绘画?大师??斐尔、丢勒、霍尔拜因、伦勃朗等有深入的研究。但是，彭斯又痴迷于中国传统书画?，对古代诗词歌赋多有涉猎，常常由于某个句子的触动而开始营构某种心境，某种精神氛围，并将它最终以图像的形式展现出来。我们从彭斯的绘画?中感受到的那种文人气或感觉氛围，在很大程度上源于他对古代诗文的研读，对古代书画?的临习。

不过，与王国维所说的古雅不同，彭斯作品中的这种感觉氛围不仅是“形式之美之形式之美”，而且与他的生命感受密切相关，是一种富有内??的形式之美，用贝尔的话来说，是一种“有意味的形式”。我第一次看到彭斯的作品，就从其中感受到一种强烈的忧郁意味。这种忧郁意味在欧洲绘画?中并不鲜见。比如，??斐尔、丢勒、德尔威勒等人的作品中都有忧郁形象的典型。经?过几年的发展，彭斯作品中的欧洲式的忧郁转变成了中国式的沉郁。

沉郁是中国古典美学的一个重要范畴，与飘逸相对。诗论家常以杜甫为沉郁的典型，以李白为飘逸的典型。沉郁的渊源可以追溯到楚辞和汉乐府那里，以悲为核心内容。王褒《洞箫赋》有云：“故知音者乐而悲之，不知者怪而伟之。”音乐以悲为尚，诗词以愁为美，这是中国古代文人非常独特的审美观。对于悲愁来说，以琴箫两种乐器最有表现力。彭斯喜欢吹笛，近年来又潜心学习古琴弹奏。古琴的学习，不仅让彭斯对中国传统艺术中的节奏和韵味有新的领会，而且对深沉的悲愁和惆怅有深刻的体会。诗词中的沉郁，音乐中的悲怨，到了画?面上就成了萧瑟和荒寒。它们是中国传统艺术追求的最高境界。

中国传统艺术之所以推崇沉郁、悲怨和荒寒，原?因在于中国古人的一种独特的生命意识，即意识到宇宙之无穷和人生之短暂，于是惜春伤秋成了文人墨客的一种普遍情怀。对过去之眷念，对源流之探索，对根底之追问，构成彭斯沉郁风格的根源。

Ⅳ

彭斯的绘画?，不仅有沉郁的一面，而且有飘逸的一面。彭斯经?常在写生中追求“逸笔草草”的境界。这里的飘逸，大致相当于彭斯追求的风或风骨，这是魏晋名士追求的精神境界。冯友兰将这种境界概括为风流。关于风流，冯友兰提出了四个方面的规定，即玄心，洞见，妙赏，深情。4  我们说彭斯的绘画?具有风流的特征，原?因在于它们也符合这四个方面的规定。

所谓玄心，大致类似于超然的审美态度。当代艺术强调介入社会生活，或者将艺术本身等同于社会事件，从而模糊艺术与非艺术之间的边界。彭斯强调艺术对现实的超越，力图从美学上维持艺术的身份，这与当代艺术崇尚介入现实，推崇从社会学上消解艺术的身份全然不同。

所谓洞见，大致类似于敏锐的审美直觉。对于当代艺术来说，审美直觉无异于现代神话。尽管当代艺术家也推崇敏感，但不是创造艺术形式和语言的审美或者艺术敏感，而是发现社会问题的政治学或社会学上的敏感。与大多数当代艺术家不同，彭斯强调审美和艺术敏感，强调艺术语言的密度和微妙性。彭斯的绘画?既不以观念宣讲取胜，也不以社会批判著称，而是以审美洞察感人。彭斯对形和色有超强的把握能力，同时将西方油画?和中国水墨的优点结合起来，形成自己洁净、精准而灵动的绘画?语言。

所谓妙赏，大致类似于宽广的审美眼光，能够在人们不能发现美的地方发现美。彭斯对艺术的爱好非常广泛，他在中央美院学习的专业是版画?，却喜欢油画?、水彩、书画?。除了造型艺术之外，彭斯也喜欢音乐，笛箫和古琴演奏也具有较高的水准。彭斯还喜欢文学，不仅喜欢阅读，而且有很好的文字表达能力。对不同门类艺术的广泛体验，有助于彭斯扩大审美眼界，提升审美趣味。

所谓深情，大致指的是一种无利害的情感，即对宇宙人生的深切同情。彭斯的绘画?很少以个人日常生活作为题材。在中国当代艺术中，曾经?有艺术家以对个人生活的零距离的微观叙事来抵抗社会主义现实主义的宏大叙事。不可否认，就对虚假的宏大叙事的解构来说，关注鸡毛蒜皮的微观叙事不失为一种有效的策略。但是，随着对虚假宏大叙事的解构任务的完成，微观叙事的意义就会大打折扣。尤其是当微观叙事本身成为一种竞相模仿的风格之后，它本身也存在虚情假意的问题。彭斯的绘画?以自然和人性为题材，将个人的情感与自然和人性联系起来，无论在广度上还是深度上都是对个人情感的拓展，因而称得上是“深情”。

Ⅴ

无论是书卷气、沉郁、还是风流，都是中国古典美学的概念。现在的问题是，用中国古典美学的概念来解读当代绘画?是否正当？不可否认，进入现代社会以来，我们采用的艺术批评术语和理论体系多半来自西方。我们的艺术史和艺术批评写作，多半采取西方模式。中国传统的艺术史观和艺术批评模式，遭到多数人的摒弃。然而，随着艺术终结、绘画?死亡的喧嚣在西方艺术界中一浪高过一浪，中国艺术家开始主动回归自身的传统进行自我救赎。对于彭斯这一代艺术家来说，“西方”光环已然暗??，文化身份日渐自觉，文化自信心和自豪感日渐走强。这一代艺术家已经?不满在西方艺术史叙事中来寻找自己的艺术定位，开始自觉地从中国艺术传统中来寻找自己的理论支持。对于体现这种意图的艺术作品来说，采用中国传统美学术语来解读也许更为恰当。

对于彭斯的绘画?来说，从不同的艺术史角度来解读会得出不同的结论。如果从西方艺术史的角度来看，彭斯的绘画?属于保守的传统主义。如果从中国艺术史的角度来看，彭斯的绘画?属于积极的改良主义。与自然进化的西方艺术史不同，中国艺术史是回溯包容式的。从自然进化的角度来看，创新程度成为衡量艺术价值的重要准则。从回溯包容的角度来看，衡量艺术价值的重要准则是历史深度。根据回溯包容式的历史观，一个艺术家从当代出发，向后追溯的历史越远，其作品包容的内容越丰富，艺术价值就越高。如果真是这样的话，艺术家就不会有布鲁姆所说的“影响的焦虑”，相反值得焦虑的倒是缺乏足够多的影响。如果一个艺术家的作品能够从历史上众多艺术家那里吸取营养，与众多艺术作品形成互文关系，那么他的作品就会获得很高的评价。相反，如果一个艺术家的作品只是异想天开的创新，与历史上的艺术作品没有任何瓜葛，那么他的作品就无法获得相应的尊重。中国传统艺术家并不反对创新，只不过他们认为每个艺术家与生俱来都是新的，要成为新的并不需要做特别的事情，相反要成为旧的则需要特别的努力才能实现。从中国艺术史的角度来看，彭斯的绘画?是中国传统绘画?的延续，是中国绘画?在21世纪所呈现的新面貌。从技法、媒材、境界等角度来看，彭斯的绘画?都是对中国传统绘画?的创造性转换，因此应获得肯定和褒扬。但是，从西方艺术史的角度来看，人们会因为彭斯依然固守架上绘画?而贬低他的创新精神。即使他的绘画?语言中创造性地融入了许多中国元素，也只能被视为对西方绘画?的无关痛痒的补充或者作为文化多样性大餐中的一道点心而得不到恰当的肯定。

彭斯的绘画?实践，将促使理论家反思艺术史叙事的方式和立场。独领风骚的西方艺术史传统将遭到挑战，多种艺术史相互竞争的局面将逐渐形成。瓦尔顿力图让我们相信，将同一件艺术作品放在不同的范畴下来感知，会得出不同的判断，只有将它放在与之相应的范畴下来感知，才能得出恰当的判断。5  瓦尔顿的这种洞见，可以从同一种艺术史和艺术传统内部，扩展到不同的艺术史和艺术传统之间。同一件艺术作品会因为不同的艺术史叙事而具有不同的位置，只有根据与之相应的艺术史叙事，才能给出该作品在艺术界中的恰当位置。正因为如此，如果从中国艺术史的角度来看彭斯的绘画?，显然更有助于我们对他的作品做出恰当的理解和判断。

Ⅵ

从中国艺术史的角度来看，尽管彭斯的绘画?包容了绘画?传统中的诸多因素，但它的面貌依然是新的，依然是当代的。但是，对于那些参照西方艺术史叙事来定位自己作品的当代艺术家来说，可能并不会认同我这里的看法。今天的中国艺术家大多有一种“当代焦虑”，艺术家们普遍担心自己的作品不够当代。其实，这种焦虑大可不必有。一旦当代性成为一种可供追逐的风格或时尚的时候，它就失去了切中当下的能力，也就失去了当代性，正如利奥塔在解释为什么现代性需要被不断重写那样。彭斯敢于表达自己的当下感受，尽管他的当下感受似乎并不符合潮流。正是因为有真实感受作为支撑，彭斯那种貌似传统的绘画?其实面貌新鲜。彭斯以一种非当代潮流的形式切中了当代。

除了“当代焦虑”之外，今天的中国艺术家还有一种“历史焦虑”，艺术家们担心自己进不了艺术史，或者干脆为了进入历史而改写历史。实际上，这种焦虑也大可不必有。没有人能够选择历史，只能被历史选择。艺术尤其如此。画?如其人，艺术作品之间的竞争最终是艺术家人格之间的竞争。只有体现自己人格的作品才具有自己的面貌，才有机会进入历史。但是，并不是所有有自己面貌的艺术，都能够进入历史。然而，艺术家既无法选择历史，更谈不上改造历史。艺术家能做的，只是争取呈现自己的面貌，然后等待历史的选择。彭斯的绘画?之所以获得广泛认可，是因为他赶上了中国文化全面复兴的时代。在经?历了一个世纪的自我怀疑、自我批判、自我解构之后，中国文化终于在新的世纪进入了建构的时代。假使时光倒流三十年，在那个全盘西化的年代里，彭斯就不容易像今天这样获得成功。


2010年6月16日于北京大学蔚秀园

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Melancholy and Free-Spirit – Interpreting Peng Si’ Paintings


                             Peng Feng

                             Professor of aesthetics and art education, philosopher, aesthetician



Unlike many other young artists’ with the perplexities of the highs and lows of the art world, Peng Si was determined to follow his own path and successfully created a series of works that was well received. What makes Peng Si’s work pleasing for its audience?


1

First of all, Peng Si’s paintings are beautiful. In contemporary art, there are very few who would critique a work of art with the word “beauty”. This trend has monopolized the art world for over a century. In the view of the abstract master Barnett Newman, “the impulse of modern art is the desire to destroy beauty.” [1] Art philosopher Arthur Danto was more radical and believed, “It is not and it never was the destiny of all art ultimately to be seen as beautiful.” More importantly, “It is extremely important to distinguish between aesthetic beauty and a wider sense of artistic excellence where aesthetic beauty may not be relevant at all.” [2] Under such antagonism of beauty, Peng Si met this current trend and consciously chose “beauty” as his aim – a challenging act in itself.


However, differing with pop art artists, Peng Si utilizes beauty with strategy. For instance, in V. Komar and A. Mellamid’s People’s Choice, beauty was not treated seriously. Most contemporary artists like to apply an ambivalent strategy in order to maximize the tension of the artwork’s interpretation. Like Morten Viskum’s painting, The Hang That Never Stops, the vivid and beautiful hand painted by a dead hand creates tension between life and death. Simply put, if a painting is done by someone living, the work then has to look like as if it’s painted by someone dead and vice versa. This is the ambivalent strategy contemporary artists have adopted. Peng Si, on the other hand, has not adopted this popular strategy. He is determined to pursue the beauty in his mind, just like the old masters.

The beauty in Peng Si’s work is dazzling on its surface. On the contrary, the beauty is fair and implicit – embodying an innate beauty of the soul. Moreover, it builds an internal connection with traditional Chinese culture. Peng Si admires the fair and balanced calligraphy of Zhao Mengfu, the grandness and solemnity of landscape paintings of the Northern Song dynasty, the free-spirited scholars of the Wei and Jin dynasties, and the melancholic cadence of Qu Yuan and Song Yu. The beauty presented by Peng Si is neither fashionable in contemporary society, nor a harmonious beauty of scale. Rather, it is the beauty of meaning valued in traditional Chinese aesthetics.  

2

With its references to traditional culture, Peng Si’s paintings seem scholarly. Being scholarly or intellectual is a key concept in Chinese painting and calligraphy theories. Wang Guowei’s analysis of “traditional elegance” facilitates our understanding of scholarly or intellectual ideas. According to Wang Guowei, “traditional elegance” is a quality acquired through learning, through the “second form” or “formal beauty of formal beauty” of an artwork[3]. In other words, traditional elegance is an unworldly impression or realm. It can only be sensed, not taught. Since it can’t be taught and only sensed, we can call it “an atmosphere of senses”. Speaking of sensing this atmosphere, it’s comparable to Mikel Dufrenne’s “the senses in all its glory,” Also, from a theoretical perspective, it resembles Danto’s atmosphere theory. In sum, the impression or realm of being scholarly or intellectual refers to a cultural aura that can be sensed. Traditional Chinese art indeed values this aura, which is found in Peng Si’s paintings.



3

Peng Si works in the medium of oil. He has studied in depth the European masters, such as Raffaello Senzio, Albrecht Dürer, Hans Holbein and Rembrandt. Yet, Peng Si is also infatuated with traditional Chinese paintings and calligraphy and he often browses ancient poetry. Often, certain phrases would touch and provoke him to render a certain state of mind or to reach a certain spiritual realm. He would eventually visualize them through images. I have sensed the intellectual aura about him, which, to a large extent, originates from his study of ancient poetry and training in ancient calligraphy and paintings.


However, unlike Wang Guowei’s “traditional elegance”, the atmosphere of senses in Peng Si’s work does not only embody “formal beauty”, but is also closely related to his understanding of life. It is a formal beauty that is rich in content. Using Clive Bell’s words, it is “form with significance”. When I first saw Peng Si’s work, a strong sense of melancholy rushed over me. Such melancholy is commonly found in the paintings of European paintings. For instance, among the works by Raphael, Durer, and Jean Delville, melancholic figures are typical. With a few years of experimentation, the European types of melancholy in Peng Si’s works have transformed into Chinese adaptations.  
Melancholy is a key field of study in traditional Chinese aesthetics, often in contrast to grace. Poetic theorists often use Du Fu as an example of melancholy, and Li Bai as the typical figure of grace. The origin of melancholy can be traced as far back in Chu poems and Han music verses that centered on sad content. Wang Bao’s poem, Flute Poem writes, “Because the ones who knows the sound, composes sad music for it. The ignorant ones find it strange and powerful.” Music is valued by its sadness and poetry’s beauty is based on anxiety – a unique aesthetic view of traditional Chinese intellectuals. To express sadness and anxiety, the zither and the flute are the two most effective instruments. Peng Si enjoys playing the flute and has been a devoted student of the zither in the last few years. This learning process has not only allowed Peng Si to gain further understanding of the rhythm and appeals of traditional Chinese arts, but has also enlightening in terms of profound melancholy and disconsolation. The sadness in the music transforms into visual desolation. It is the ultimate realm of traditional Chinese art values.      

The reason traditional Chinese art values melancholy, sadness and desolation is based on a unique understanding of ancient Chinese life, an understanding of the vastness of the universe and the ephemera of life. Thus, the shared intellectual sentiment is founded on reminiscing about the spring and saddening autumn. Reminiscing on the past, exploring origins, and probing roots are the basis for Peng Si’s melancholic style.


4

Peng Si’s paintings are both melancholic and free-spirited. Often in his drawings, he aims to practice the “cursive lines”. The free-spirit referred to here is similar to the vigor of style the artist pursues – a spiritual realm that intellectuals of the Wei and Jin dynasties valued. Feng Youlan has summarized this realm as grace. Furthermore, Feng proposed four aspects of grace: mysterious mind, clear vision, ingenious taste, and profound emotions. Peng Si’s paintings embody these characteristics of grace.  

The so-called mysterious mind is similar to a surreal aesthetic attitude. Contemporary art emphasizes its intervention in social life or equates art to social events in order to blur boundaries between art and non-art. Peng Si’s emphasis on the transcendence of art from reality is aimed at maintaining the identity of art from an aesthetic angle, which differs entirely from art’s intervention in reality and diminishing the identity of art by valuing sociology.


“Clear vision” refers to an incisive aesthetic instinct. For contemporary art, the aesthetic instinct is no different from a modern myth. Although contemporary artists value sensibility, it is not about creating artistic forms, languages or sensibilities, but about the politics of sociology or sociological sensibility. Unlike most artists, Peng Si’s emphasis on aesthetics and artistic sensibility rests on the density and subtlety of language. Peng Si’s neither excels at conceptual propagation nor is known for his social critiques. Instead he touches the viewers with aesthetic sensitivity. Peng Si’s command of forms and colors is outstanding. In combining the strength of western oil painting and traditional Chinese paintings, he formulates his own pristine, concise and vivid artistic language.


“Ingenious taste” refers to his broad aesthetic taste, an ability to discover beauty where it is overlooked. Peng Si’s interaction with art is broad. His major at the Central Academy of Fine Art was printmaking, but he was also very fond of oil painting, guache and calligraphy. Besides fine art, Peng Si also enjoys music and has attained a certain level in playing the flute and zither. Moreover, his interest in literature is not only limited to reading, but also being expressive with words. His wide experiences of different artistic fields allow him to broaden his view, thus refining his aesthetic tastes.


“Profound emotion” largely refers to a type of nonchalant feeling, a deep sympathy with the universe and life. It is very rare that Peng Si’s subject matter is inspired by personal, quotidian experiences. In contemporary Chinese art, one can often find artists to resist the grand socialist and realist narratives with one’s own narrative based on his observation of everyday life. Undoubtedly, focusing on the scattered microscopic narrative is an effective strategy in deconstructing the false grand narrative. However, as the deconstruction of the false narrative becomes complete, the significance of microscopic narration is deduced, especially if it becomes a narrative style that many tries to imitate, then its pretenses would also surface. The subject matter in Peng Si’s paintings are found in man and nature, They bridge personal emotions to nature and man, either in scope or depth. They are expansions of personal emotions, thus are referred to as “profound emotions.”  

5

The scholarliness, melancholy and grace are all concepts of classical Chinese aesthetics. The current question is whether it is appropriate to apply classical Chinese aesthetic concepts to interpret contemporary paintings? Without a doubt, since entering modern society, the language of critique and the theoretical system are largely adopted from. Our own art history and writing art criticism are also largely follows the western model. Many abandoned their views on traditional Chinese art history and models of art critique. Yet, as the claim of the end of art and the death of painting surges in the western art world, Chinese artists began to return to their own tradition for salvation. For Peng Si’s generation of artists, the halo of the “West” already dimmed, one’s cultural identity became clearer and artists gained their cultural confidence and pride. It is a generation of artists no longer satisfied with finding their position within the western art narrative, but are seeking out their own theories in Chinese art tradition. For the artworks that manifest such intent, perhaps using traditional Chinese aesthetics to interpret it would be more appropriate.


Different angles of art history would offer different interpretations of Peng Si’s works. From a western art historical perspective, Peng Si’s paintings are considered conservative and traditional. From a Chinese art historical angle, Peng Si’s art is considered active and reformist. Unlike the natural evolution of western art history, Chinese art history tend to be revisionist and inclusive. From an evolutionary perspective, the creativity becomes an important stand to measure artistic value. From a revisionist inclusive angle, historical depth is a key measurement for artistic value. From a revising and inclusive historical view, an artist’s departure from the present and his tracing back into the far depth of history, the farther back he returns, enriches his content; thus the higher the quality of his art. If this is the case, artists would not experience anxiety of influence, as suggested by Harold Bloom. On the contrary, what would make them anxious would be the lack of influence. If an artist’s work can learn from other artists throughout history and create a rapport with other artworks, then his work would receive higher praise. Conversely, if an artist’s works are creations of his imagination without any relevance to historical artworks, then his work would not gain the same respect. Chinese artists do not resist creativity, although they believe that every artist is innately new. But to become new does not require anything unique. A special effort is required to learn from the old and embody its essence. From the Chinese art historical perspective, Peng Si’s paintings are continuation of traditional Chinese painting, presenting a new phase of Chinese painting in the 21st century. His paintings have transformed traditional painting with regards to techniques, medium and the attainment of the spiritual realm. Thus, Peng Si has received affirmation and praise. On the other hand, from the western art historical perspective, some would diminish his creative spirit due to his tenacious determination to make works on canvas. Even though his artistic language has incorporated many Chinese elements, they are often not respected and are seen as dispensable supplements to western painting or as complementary to the plethora of cultural diversity.   


Peng Si’s artistic experiment prompts art theorists to reflect on the narrative approach and stance of art history. The dominating western art history is challenged with the gradual formation of the diversity of art history. K. Walton aims to make us believe that different interpretations are possible for the same artwork within different contexts. However, only putting it in its relevant context is an appropriate interpretation possible.[4] Walton’s insight can be expanded from one art history, or the essence of art tradition, to different art histories and the relationship among them. The same artwork would take on different positions according to the art historical narrative applied to interpret it. It is then possible to position it appropriately. For this reason, to interpret Peng Si’s work from the Chinese art historical perspective, it would be more helpful for us to make the correct judgment and comprehension.

6

Although Peng Si’s paintings have incorporated many elements from traditional painting, his works, however, are still refreshing and contemporary. However, artists who position their art practice according to western art historical narrative would not necessarily agree with my view. Most Chinese artists today share the “contemporary anxiety” and are worried that their work is not “contemporary” enough. In fact, this anxiety is unnecessary. Once contemporaneity becomes a pursuable style or trend, it loses its ability to project the present. Thus losing its contemporaneity, similar to Jean-Francois Lyotard’s explanation on the necessity of revising modernity. Peng Si is courageous to express his sentiment of the present, even though they might not necessarily fit with current trends. It is through these precisely promptings of true sentiments that his seemingly traditional works can embody a refreshing impression. Peng Si projects the contemporary in a non-contemporary form.   


Besides the anxiety of “not being contemporary enough”, today’s Chinese artists also share a “historical anxiety”. Artists are worried that they will not be written into history or feel that they need to revise history in order to be marked in history. In fact, it is also unnecessary. No one can choose history. They can only be chosen by history. This is especially the case in art. Art is a manifestation of the artist. The competition among artworks is essentially a competition of the artists’ characters. Only works projecting one’s character would be claimed as one’s own and can then have the possibility to be chosen by history. However, the contrary is also true. Yet, artist can neither choose history nor revise history. What the artist can do is make his best effort to present his true nature, and then be chosen by history. The reason for Peng Si’s work to gain wide affirmation is his participation in a time of revival of Chinese culture. After a century of self-doubt, self-criticism, and self-deconstruction, Chinese culture has finally entered an era of rebuilding in the new millennium. If it were thirty years ago in the era of western influence, Peng Si’s paintings would not easily gain the success it enjoys today.


Garden of Azure Elegance, Peking University

June 16, 2010





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[1] Barnett Newman, “The Sublime is Now”, in Barnett Newman: Selected Writings and Interviews (New York: Knopf, 1990), p. 172.

[2] Arthur Danto, The Abuse of Beauty: Aesthetics and the Concept of Art (Peru, Ill., Open Court, 2003), pp.36, 107.

[3] Wang Guowei, The Position of Traditional Elegance in Aesthetics, in Collection of Wang Guowei’s Writings, Vol.3. (Beijing, China Literary History Publications, 1997), p. 32.

[4] Kendall L. Walton, “Categories of Art”, Philosophical Review (1970) pp. 334-367.

来源：彭斯BLOG  http://blog.sina.com.cn/pengsi