文/张宏伟
在西北地区的摄影创作者中,纯碱从一开始就用直觉把握了影像最核心的部分开启了他随心所欲的创作。他的作品不符合广大传统摄影读者中形成的群众信服的非常固化的摄影标准。在他们眼中纯碱是在“乱拍”。纯碱的“乱拍”的作品频频曝光参展,使他成为了西北摄影创作的“先锋”。
“先锋”的纯碱挑战的不仅仅是固有的拍摄观念,还有大量习惯传统摄影作品的阅读者突破的是已有关于摄影定义的边界。也许正是纯碱创作开启的时候,西北的摄影创作在“陕西群体”3之后才进入另外一个新阶段。摄影是可以“乱拍”的,“乱拍”让摄影进入了更丰富时,也步入了更艰难的阶段——当代摄影。纯碱“乱拍”的影像多来自自己熟悉的安多藏区日常。在近年的创作中,纯碱将镜头对准属于自己独一无二的各类无人空间,如大门、窗户、公路、汽车,又或者只是看似简单的几何构成。这些即强烈又安静的影像让观者完全沉浸其中,画面中的构成造就的视觉牵引既让人更加专注其关注的主体,也给人以无限遐想的空间。
仔细观看纯碱的《牙什尕/安多 19》这张色彩强烈的似乎有点偏色的照片,能看到其受到沃尔夫冈·提尔曼斯(Wolfgang Tillmans 1968- )的影响,这张作品的独特在于他的动态瞬间定格,仿佛是从录像中截取的瞬间,介乎于静态影像与动态影像之间,特别能反映当下摄影艺术与录像艺术之间暧昧关系。
《牙什尕》系列作为一个切片展示了当下一个普通藏区的日常影像,揭示了有关西方视角的东方想象,和有关东方主义的相关思考,以及直接摄影作品和当代艺术之间对话的可能性。这一介于具体和抽象之间的系列影像作品,不仅展示了当下安多藏区人和环境的关系。而且让我们确信,在当今这个色彩与图像饱和的年代,纯碱仍然保持着一份冷静且执着的信念。沿着这份坚定我们发现《牙什尕》系列最大意义是做为出生安多的纯碱“第一次”站到相机背后,用个人的视角观察熟悉的地方:安多藏族,作为内部他者,纯碱与那些内地摄影师的猎奇有所不同,他拍摄的不是大多数摄影师热衷的画面,他的作品冷静平实。也许正是这份冷静,这份平实,让他更好的诠释了什么才是好的藏区影像。
2020年12月6日,于陕西西安
注释:
1: “牙什尕”即“牙什尕镇”,隶属于青海省海东市化隆回族自治县,地处化隆回族自治县西南部,东与群科镇接壤,南临黄河与尖扎县康杨镇隔河相望,西与查甫藏族乡毗邻,北接扎巴镇,是卫藏、康巴、安多三大藏区的交汇点。《牙什尕》是纯碱藏区影像三部曲的第一部。
2: 中国藏区,按照方言划分为卫藏、康巴、安多三大区域。安多(Amdo)十分辽阔,她包括除玉树以外的青海全境、甘肃的甘南与河西,以及川西的阿坝等涉藏州县。
3: “陕西纪实摄影群体”简称“陕西群体”,1986年之后成为中国摄影界的专有名词,代表人物有:侯登科、胡武功、石宝琇、潘科等。
4: 沃尔夫冈·提尔曼斯 (Wolfgang Tillmans 1968-)是当今最有影响力的摄影艺术家之一。2000年,他成为第一个获得英国特纳奖(欧洲重要的艺术大奖,以发展和推动先锋艺术为宗旨)的非英国籍艺术家,也是第一个凭借摄影作品获得该奖项的艺术家。
5:摄影史学者、评论家复旦大学顾铮教授认为杨延康的《心象》是“呈现人与信仰的终极关系”。《心象》中有近三分之一的照片拍摄于安多,该作品创作跨度10年,是中国关于藏区影像传播最广的作品。
本文为2021年3月纯碱《牙什尕》徕卡画廊个展前言,后被收录《中国当代摄影图录|纯碱》卷一书:《〈牙什尕〉:在安多藏区慢走的意义》作者:张宏伟;《中国当代摄影图录|纯碱》,主编:刘铮,摄影:纯碱,浙江摄影出版社,2023年01月版。
张宏伟,(1983)策展人、影像作品收藏者。先后毕业于西北师大和中央美院,西画廊&直接摄影艺术空间主理人。工作生活于湖州、兰州两地,频繁往返于长三角和西北之间。他的策展与收藏是以艺术史和艺术行业的运行机制为研究与实践基础。立足本土,以艺术家、导演、摄影师的个案为主要策展方向,进行长期深入的考察、研究与合作。他在策展和收藏中,倡导直接摄影,学术性地融汇了当下影像艺术的力量。力求将具有时代延展性的作品,以艺术史的维度展开于公共或商业空间的场域之中,呈现这个时代艺术家的生命经验,让能效最大化实现,勾联出佐证当下大历史中的艺术轮廓。
Yashigat 1: In the Tibetan area of Amdo 2:The meaning of slow walking
by ZhangHongwei
Among the photographers in Northwest China,Chunjian grasped the core part of the image intuitively from the very beginning and started his arbitrary creation. His work does not conform to the very rigid standards of photography that the masses have come to believe in among the vast audience of traditional photography readers. In their eyes, Chunjian is “flapping”. Chunjian’s “random shooting” works are frequently exposed and exhibited, making him a “pioneer” in Northwest photography creation.
“Pioneer” Chunajian challenges not only the inherent concept of photography, but also a large number of readers who are accustomed to traditional photography work to break through the boundaries of the existing definition of photography. Perhaps it is precisely when the creation of Chunjian was opened, the photography creation in Northwest China entered another new stage after the “Shaanxi Group” 3. Photography can be “disorderly shooting”, “disorderly shooting” allows photography to enter a richer, but also into a more difficult stage – contemporary photography. The images of Chunjian “random shooting” mostly come from the daily life of Amdo Tibetan areas that they are familiar with. In recent years, Chunjian has focused his lens on his own unique unmanned Spaces, such as doors, Windows, roads, cars, or just seemingly simple geometric formations. These strong and quiet images make the viewer completely immersed in them, and the visual traction created by the composition of the picture not only makes people more focused on the subject of their attention, but also gives people space for unlimited reverie.
If you look closely at Chunjian’s “Yashgar/Amdo 19”, a strong and seemingly off-color photograph, you can see that it was influenced by Wolfgang Tillmans (1968-), and this work is unique in his dynamic moment freeze, as if taken from a video. Between the static image and the dynamic image, especially can reflect the ambiguous relationship between the current photography art and video art.
As a slice of the daily images of an ordinary Tibetan area in the present, the”Yashgai “series reveals the eastern imagination from a Western perspective, the relevant reflections on orientalism, and the possibility of dialogue between direct photographic works and contemporary art. This series of video works, between concrete and abstract, not only shows the relationship between people and the environment in the Tibetan area of Amdo today. And let us be sure that in this age of color and image saturation, Chunjian still maintains a calm and persistent faith. Along this firm line, we find that the greatest significance of the”Yashigat” series is that as Chunjian born in Amdo, he stood behind the camera “for the first time” and observed familiar places from a personal perspective: The Amdo Tibetan, as an internal other, Chunjian is different from the curiosity of the mainland photographers, he does not shoot the images that most photographers are keen on, his work is calm and plain. Perhaps it is this calm, this plain, let him better interpret what is a good image of Tibetan areas.
December 6, 2020 in Xi ‘an, Shaanxi province
Notes:
1: “Yashiga”, that is, “Yashiga Town”, belongs to Hualong Hui Autonomous County, Haidong City, Qinghai Province, is located in the southwest of Hualong Hui Autonomous County, bordering Qunke Town in the east, facing the Yellow River in the south and Kangyang Town, Jianzha County across the river, adjacent to Zhafu Tibetan Township in the west, and Zaba Town in the north, which is the intersection point of the three Tibetan areas of Weizang, Kangba and Amdo. “Yashigat” is the first of a trilogy of Chunjian Tibetan films.
2: Tibetan areas in China are divided into three regions according to dialects: Weizang, Kangba and Amdo. Amdo is very vast, including the whole of Qinghai except Yushu, Gannan and Hexi in Gansu, and Aba and other Tibet-related counties in western Sichuan.
3: “Shaanxi documentary Photography Group”, referred to as “Shaanxi Group”, has become a proper term in Chinese photography circles since 1986, representative figures include: Hou Dengke, Hu Wugong, Shi Baoxiu, Pan Ke, etc.
4: Wolfgang Tillmans (1968-) is one of the most influential photographic artists today. In 2000, he became the first non-British artist to win the Turner Prize, Europe’s leading art award for the development and promotion of avant-garde art, and the first artist to do so for his photography.
5: Professor Gu Zheng of Fudan University, a scholar and critic of photography history, believes that Yang Yankang’s<Mind Image> is “presenting the ultimate relationship between man and faith.” Nearly one third of the images in “Mind Image” were taken in Amdo, and the work spanned 10 years, making it the most widely disseminated work on Tibetan areas in China.
This article is the preface to chunjian’s solo exhibition “Yashiga” at Leica Gallery in March 2021, which was later included in the book of Contemporary Chinese Photography Album | Ash: “Yashiga” : The Meaning of Walking Slowly in the Tibetan Areas of Amdo. Author: Zhang Hongwei; Annals of Contemporary Chinese Photography | Soda Ash, editor-in-chief: Liu Zheng, Photograph: chunjian, Zhejiang Photographic Publishing House, January, 2023.
Zhang Hongwei, (1983) Curator and collector of video works. He graduated from Northwest Normal University and Central Academy of Fine Arts, West Gallery & Director of Direct Photography Art space. He works and lives in Huzhou and Lanzhou, and travels frequently between the Yangtze River Delta and the northwest. His curation and collection are based on the research and practice of art history and the working mechanism of the art industry. Based on the local, with the case of artists, directors and photographers as the main direction of curation, long-term in-depth investigation, research and cooperation. In his curation and collection, he advocates direct photography and academically integrates the power of current video art. We strive to spread the works with the extension of The Times in the field of public or commercial space with the dimension of art history, present the life experience of artists in this era, maximize the energy efficiency, and connect the outline of art that supports the current history.