December 2011 Phoenixweekly Lifestyle Interview 凤凰周刊·生活 访谈 [PDF]
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不可见的可见 To See The Invisible
什么是见？看见碰见听见偏见，见识见地见异思迁见仁见智。可见“见”并不止用眼睛“看”，也不仅仅是一个动作的过程，还包括动作之后的结果，更重要的是见到了什么。
什么是可见？可见光、不可见的未来。可见就是见的首要也是必要条件，不可见的反面。这是一个同语反复的文字游戏？对。“不可见的可见”也是一个语言游戏，不同的是，这个回路的出口是“不”。
另一个问题，什么是语言？它可见吗？“我的语言的界限意味着我的世界的界限”，我的视觉的界限绝不是我的世界的界限。世界不是被看到的。语言是思想的肉身，思想不是一个东西一种形容，而是一个动作，它发生在——我行为/你见——之前、之中、之后。
我想我大概说清楚了，但我不知道你是否明白了[……]另外，我不确定你到底见到了什么，或者你想见到什么。
如果你问：见到的可见和不可见哪一个更真实？我说：我的悲伤不是你的。
都是胡言。
[为学生影展的前言]
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2011/06/09-13 solo exhibition V
由内往外的观望 [倪昆] PDF
以显性形态存在的女性艺术家之创作，通常离不开关于身体或身份的追问。就本质而言，女性艺术是添加了“女性”前缀的艺术家创作，这在事实上也给女性艺术家的作品贴上了“体验，感性，私密性以及和身体，身份有关”的标签，是迥异于男性艺术家的表达的，而这也恰恰是女性艺术的特殊性魅力之所在。（女性艺术所强调的身体性与女性主义艺术所明确强调的激进立场，也可以被看成为同一创作群体的不同创作态度，其同一性在于创作主体对于身体及身份的把握，差异则在于立场及政治诉求。）
在谈论庞璇的艺术创作之前论及女性及女性主义艺术，是因为我觉得有必要明确一点。在当前中国的具体语境下，存在于中国的女性艺术创作和女性主义无关。当代艺术的创作离不开与之对应的语境，虽然就表达技巧和手法而言，重复女性主义艺术创作只是方法问题，但是被抽空了的外部现实才是艺术作品是否成立的最关键点。
以身体作为媒介来感知世界，一直是女性艺术家最重要的创作来源，这一点在庞璇的创作中，在其创作起点就展露无遗。虽说感性在很多时候可以成为第一性的要素，不过建立在感性感知下的表述系统，在事实上所建构起的艺术家独特而风格化的视觉语言系统，才可能成为艺术家之根本。这也是我认为的，对于女性艺术家而言最重要的工作。
十余年的艺术创作实践，就其关注点而言，有一个明显的分界点：2008年前的艺术家之思考，可以集中用“身体，城市，青春”来描述；近些年的作品，其表达维度则拓宽至“时间，历史，记忆”等更富思辨性的内容。这是其思维成熟的外化体现。
庞璇是一位有着极强的视觉控制能力的艺术家，这种关于视觉表现上的游刃有余，一来自敏锐的天赋，一来自长期的学院训练。“敏感的，尖锐的，不稳定的，私密性的”这些都可以成为其语言风格的描述语。作为一位跨媒介艺术创作者，至少在很长一段时间里，录像和摄影是艺术家主要的创作方向。媒介就属性而言有着各自不同的自然特性，这也让她的作品可以在坚持一贯主题的表述下，在不同层面展开可彼此参看的对话。
她的录像作品，其开端源于对于自我身体的关注，与青春有关，与身份有关，更与体验有关，是其阶段性非常重要的创作。相对而言，不连贯的摄影创作，却在主题游移变化中，呈现出一个更为生动立体的思考脉络及线索。与“青春—记忆”有关的《迷之家族史II》（2003），与“身体—身份”对话的《无常》（2004），“私密—神秘”的《明镜台》（2008），“借历史展开自我清理”的《1/26000》、《故/事》（2007-2011）。2008年开始的转变是一个缓慢的过程，风格统一性在其中起到了关键作用。作品系列《物》，可以直接和《内在空间》（2002-2004）产生关联，《内在空间》的圆形构图是生物学意义上的观看，在《物》中，则衍变为有着中国古典气质被观看。更进一步的创作，体现在《语词》系列中，艺术家超越了之前所迷恋的关于“生命”的追问，“历史以及构成历史的语法”成为她当前关注的视点，而其起点，则是结合了中国画表现方法的“物”。
这是一个有趣的变化过程，起始于内容，推衍于风格，最后落脚在更广维度上的历史对话，是良性的自我生长，也是值得一再被关注的艺术家实践。
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Outlook from Inside –
Critic on Pang Xuan’s Recent Art Work
Ni Kun
The study on body and identity has been a major theme in the art practice of female artists. Female art, in its nature, is the art practice under a female title. As a matter of fact, it has been labeled with a series of key words, such as experience, sensibility, intimacy, body and identity. The differentiation with male perspective makes it a unique art form. Before we talk about Pang Xuan’s art work, we need to clarify that the female art, in the current situation in China, is not relevant to feminism art. Although it methodologically shares some of the skills and techniques, but the general social and political context makes the split.
The human body, as a media to perceive the outside world, has been one of the major inspirations for female artist. Xuan is among them, especially at the start point of her art practice. Although sensibility, on its own, could be the prime principle of art, but the uniqueness and the stylization of visual language system, which is constructed on the sensibility, is of more importance. It is the fundamental essence of art, especially for these female artists.
The year of 2008 is a turning point in Pang Xuan’s art practice. Before 2008, her key words were “body, city, and youth”; after 2008, she put more critical thoughts on “time, history, and memory”. Xuan is highly gifted in visual effect control. It comes from both her natural art sense, and her long term fine art academy training. Her visual language is sensitive, sharp, unstable, and intimate.
As a multi-disciplinary artist, her work ranges from oil painting to video/ photography, and recently she focuses more on the latter. As each art media has its own particular nature, the differences make it possible for her works to interact and to be references to each other on various levels, when they are under a consistent theme.
The video work of Pang Xuan starts from the study on her own body. It is a solid master piece in that period, concerning about youth, identity, and personal experience.
Compared to her video work, the inconsistent and shifting themes of her photography approach show the multi-dimensions of her art concept. The “Mysterious Family History” series is about youth and memory; the “Nonconstant” series is about body and identity; the “Dustless Mirror” series is about intimacy and mystery; the “Myth” and “Legend” series is about history and self-awareness.
Xuan has experienced a long and slow change since 2008. The consistency of visual style plays a key role in the transformation. For example, the “Object” series directly relates to the “Inner Space” series (2003-2004). The rounded shape in the “Inner Space” series insinuates the sense of being watched from a biological perspective; and the similar composition in the “Object” series evolves to a classical Chinese cultural icon, and it insinuates the sense of being watched from a cultural perspective. Further more, in the “Word and Phrase” series, Xuan gives up her obsession on questioning body and live. She starts to concern about history and the languages on which history is constructed. The change relates to the “Object” series. It has been a quite unique growing process, which starts from the content, then triggered by the new form introduced, and ends up with a wider perspective.
Xuan’s art practice is to be widely concerned.
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2011/06/09-13 solo exhibition IV
风景、身体与笔触之妆 [鲍栋] PDF
庞璇一直处于那种磨磨蹭蹭、谨小慎微，但精益求精的状态中，这使得她能够保持一种敏感、内省的感觉状态。不管是何种题材，何种媒介，何种艺术类型，庞璇都会使它们驯服，使它们获得精致而细巧的外观，并布满精巧的紧致的细节。就像是一个古代的造园师，抑或一个养盆景的花匠，庞璇似乎更喜欢在细微处做文章，她毫不忌讳题材的小，甚至她时常有意去捕捉一种渺小之感，而正在因为有了渺小，宏大即显得有了依据。
例如，她拍摄天空，拍下那些云影的细节，但却为这些照片加上公元纪年的标题。那张乌云密布的天空叫做《公元前，2370年2月17日》，而那一块有着舒缓云朵的和煦天空则叫做《645年，春》，在这种大体量的时间刻度下，天空被底片记录下的那一瞬间的短暂被强调出来，被纳入了一种时间的仪式。而那些漂亮、繁琐，由庞璇精心挑选的镜框无疑是这种仪式感的再次申明，一方面，它们使时间凝固，另一方面又使得观看收缩，最重要的是，正是它们无可辩驳的物质实在性反衬出了天空那无可奈何的虚空，就像精心化妆的面孔对比出无神的瞳孔。是的，庞璇要指出的或许就是这种虚无感。时间的、历史的、自然的、文化的，所有这一切的虚无感都在那些精巧的、充满感官性的表面的背后蔓延开来，我们的看到的表面只是一层壳，但是这层壳之下并无他物，除了虚无本身，此外一无所有。
庞璇的那些与身体有关的摄影也似乎在摆明这种世界观：身体的局部在那些微缩的楼亭摆件的衬托下呈现出非人化的巨大尺度，身体背后的意义似乎被抽空，因此，庞璇把身体的局部转换为“风景”正是指向了“皮相”这个概念。
实际上，皮相不仅仅可以指人，更可以指人类文化的某种本质。她把传统水墨的拆散为毫无章法依据的局部，使那些局部从那个和谐的整体中解放出来而获得独立的存在，再用铅笔描摹出这些无机的局部——这实际上就是一个去精神化而回到物质表皮的过程。就像把音乐还原为无关联的音节，把语言还原成毫无意义的痕迹，把绘画还原为毫无美学的涂抹，然后这恰恰构成了一种极端的虚无美学。
川端康成在一篇小说中，描述了一位母亲对女儿尸体的凝视，“女儿的脸生平第一次化妆，真像是一位出嫁的新娘”。
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Landscape, Body and Makeup brushstroke
Bao Dong
Pang Xuan, maintains a sensitive, observant, introspective perspective with all subject matters of her work by a extremely slow and cautious work attitude. She tames and perfects their delicate appearance, using different media to capture the elements that signify the nuance of the magnificent factor. Like an ancient Chinese gardener or even a Bonsai cultivator, she never resists small theme, furthermore, she intentionally captures the smallness, on which the greatness is based.
Sky is one of her photography themes. She photographs the details of the clouds, and titles with a specific historical time. For example, a cloudy sky is named as Feb 17th, 2370 BC; and a bright sky with scattered clouds is named as Spring 645 AD. The fleeting moment when the sky is recorded by the film is emphasized by contrasting with the massiveness of the imaginary time scale, and is brought into a ritual of time. Pang Xuan carefully selects frames that reaffirm a moment frozen in time. A moment that materializes from the sky where it becomes evident that the surface is only the outer layer of a shell.
Through her body-related photography, this concept is reaffirmed as the body becomes a landscape. By putting tiny pagoda and miniature trees on human body, the scale of the body is magnified, and on the same time the meaning of the body is deconstructed. The transformation from body to landscape points to the concept of “empty shell”.
By her Word & Phrase Series, Pang Xuan reexamines the “empty shell” concept from a cultural perspective. She copies random parts from traditional ink paintings. A delicate stroke created from ink, offers heights and depths, pitfalls, ethereal balances, and subliminal forms to draw the viewer into a nihility void of conglomerate meanings which protest and tear apart. Unlike traditional ink art artist Xuan commits to boundaries which highlight her pencils to restore the pureness of forms.
In one of his novel, Kawabata Cannes described a mother looking at her dead daughter: “It is the first time she wears makeup on her face. She looks like a bride.”