戚雅峰的金刚道

金刚之态

藉多年来对中国当代雕塑的研究，这次今日美术馆的合作令我观察到戚雅峰是一位不受传统技法约束的艺术家，他像是一名炼金术士，以创新的眼光、技艺和判断，将中国传统与当代艺术观念相熔炼。

此次展览展出的雕塑新作是一次重要的契机，系观看艺术家在其力量巅峰，结合灵与力，将手作技艺提升到当代雕塑的新境界。我很惊叹于戚雅峰在工作室的艺术状态，以及其充满激情和活力的创作过程。这引发我去探寻其作品的可能性，即延伸成为由数件作品组成的装置，同时将装置以其本身之力变成具有雕塑性质的环境。于我而言，能看到一个艺术家如何与相对性和相对之力博弈，是很重要的一个环节。一个艺术家，在创造实体产物的同时如何维系灵性和美学上的判断?我希望通过如此的视觉故事，来揭示戚雅峰作品中强大的二元性。

戚雅峰的作品突显了内部空间结合外在形式的观念，他时而创造平衡，时而呼唤着更加激烈对抗的张力。这种精彩的矛盾性体现在他的雕塑流露着泰然自若、意味深长的衡稳之态，而这一切却诞生于艺术家饱满的、野心勃勃的努力——迸射着灵感，创造多元的作品，并向各个方向拓展!

我们理解戚雅峰的作品需要打破雕塑是具体表达某一空间的传统认知——在最好的状态下他的雕塑凭借作品本身的力量成为一个场所——它类似缩微景观或光影丛林，是虚空的雕塑，根植于道家却绽放成为繁茂的当代艺术奇景。

戚雅峰成长于审美和手艺浸润的家庭背景下，舅舅张小林以不锈钢雕塑颇具名望。家族事业的生产观念在戚雅峰工作室的创作中可见一斑，作品多产，且纵览作品时会呈现出相似美学的形式“群落”，同时每一件又有独立的语境。

展览

本次就今日美术馆最重要的策展决策，是将艺术家的工作室和工厂氛围置入展厅，由此颂扬日常制作的技术、噪声和物质性。我们决意纳入钢铁敲击、打磨和塑形的影像，加入工厂的声效——那些终日振颤回绕的钢铁加工的声音轨迹。值得一提的是，戚雅峰说他可以仅通过听锤子敲击辨认出声音出自工作室哪位技师之手。我非常希望在展览空间重现制造的场景，配以过程照片，并展出本身即具有雕塑特质的铸铁模具。整个展览结构是沿着艺术家的泥塑模型照片，到玻璃钢材质的小件作品，再到强光映射下具有戏剧性影深、经过精细抛光的大型雕塑。我希望我们能在最终的大体量作品的“诗意性”旁侧，营造出工厂的“剧场性”，由此得以完整地呈现艺术家的创作旅程。

影响

戚雅峰的雕塑作品具有强烈的平衡感，他的美学语汇源于自然界和谐及道家哲学的积淀。

戚雅峰用东方宗教哲学美学的思维，以观念的、形式的、技术的 “三位一体”加固了他的创作概念，但他带入了当代性和前瞻性，他并不仅仅满足于简单的历史引述，而是寻求实践并在21世纪全球性艺术惯例之上鼓励新的艺术思考方式。

上个世纪五六十年代，亨利•摩尔从手绘、人物和风景发展出半抽象的形式，从而重新定义了英国雕塑。摩尔早期对雕刻的痴迷展现了身体的挑战和心态的状态。

“雕刻对我而言已经是一种宗教……我喜欢我必须从一块石头开始，并在其中寻找到里面的雕塑的事实。你需要用纯粹的决心和艰苦努力，来克服材料带来的阻力。”

如同摩尔，戚雅峰也对工艺性和雕塑过程有着坚定的信仰，因为形式的本质即在制作的过程中被揭示。

我们不该忘了戚雅峰也是大体量雕塑的创造者，他有五件大型作品摆放在今日美术馆室外公共空间，与日趋程式化的雕塑与城市本身都形成强烈的对比——即艺术家个体以雕塑引发的创新观念，对比为服从统一标准而批量生产的建筑或公共空间。相对于工程师和电脑科学家花费长时间通过复杂的数学和运算法则生成的设计结构，艺术家如戚雅峰等从不同角度入手，运用的是最原初的材料如水墨、黏土和石膏，以及对外型、比例和平衡的内心直觉。

戚雅峰雕塑的其中一个杰出特质，是他能够驾驭小型、亲近尺度的作品，同时也能把控尺度，将其转化成大型、潜在的公共性雕塑。他的草书系列是从书法笔触到三维立体形态的优雅变形。我们有幸能在展览入口处展示艺术家早期实践性的水墨手稿，以示雕塑家的思维路径和相关的草书语汇的雕塑形态。

作为英国策展人，我非常乐与中国当代艺术家合作，思考如何能以不同的模式在今日美术馆展示戚雅峰作品，如何以一个更为国际和当代的艺术语境展现艺术家在艺术实践过程中的精髓。在2016年，我们很容易以全球化语境来考量艺术家的作品，不同大陆的事物在这样的环境中都显得大同小异——特别是当上百种国际艺术双年展举办，其中艺术家常以展会熟手搭建临时的装置艺术。从我的角度，我觉得戚雅峰的作品和他作为一个艺术家的感知度，是植根于中国传统美学思辨和道家观念的更深层的传统。与戚雅峰的合作，我发现了一个非常前卫的艺术家，他有着自己独有的开拓途径，不受当代艺术市场风潮的变化影响，却更多地关注在更高的艺术目的，来启迪和超越。

结语

戚雅峰正处在他艺术生涯中的高产阶段，在这一阶段中，他的精湛技艺、精神关注和艺术感性达成了平衡。他的创作受到越来越多的国际关注，本次展览将是一次特别的机会，以观看其体量不同寻常的新作。戚雅峰的雕塑携带着一种表述，即尽管抽象，它们也体现了人性的特质或是情感态度。这正是戚雅峰技艺的核心以及作为一个艺术家的判断，他以持续的才能创作雕塑，其形式富有一种特别的清晰度和纯度，而同时也在讲述我们的情感，反映着我们的精神关切。

马修 贾纳特

2016年6月

Qi Yafeng

Unbreakable Poise

After studying contemporary sculpture across China for many years my experience of working with Qi Yefeng on his show at Today Art Museum is that he is an artist who is not constrained by the traditions of technique but also an alchemist with the creative vision, skills and judgement to meld Chinese tradition with contemporary art concepts.

The new sculptures presented in the exhibition are an important opportunity to see an artist working at the height of their powers, combining the spiritual with the physical and taking hand-made crafted traditions into new areas of contemporary sculpture. I have been astounded by Qi’s artistic approach in the studio and the vigour and excitement of his creative process and that has led me to explore ways for his work to grow into an installation of multiple works and then for the installation to become a sculptural environment in its own right. It is important to show how an artist wrestles with opposites and opposing forces– I wanted to draw out the powerful duality in Qi’s work through the visual story of how an artist approaches the physical production whilst maintaining his spiritual and aesthetic judgement.

Qi’s work embodies an idea of interior space and exterior form - sometimes creating equilibrium and sometimes summoning a more conflicting tension. There is an exciting contradiction with Qi’s sculpture that is so well poised, eloquent and balanced yet produced by an artist with such and energetic and ambitious endeavour - bursting with ideas, producing multiple works, and evolving ideas in every direction!

We need to think of Qi’s work as going beyond a traditional idea of sculpture which embodies a space – at its best Qi’s sculpture becomes a ‘place’ in its own right – it is sculpture as miniature landscape or shadowy forest, sculpture as void and sculpture from a Taoist root which is flourishing into an abundant contemporary phenomenon.

Qi Yafeng has grown up in a nurturing family of artistic minds and skilled craftspeople with an uncle Zhang Xiaolin who was renowned for his work with stainless steel. The idea of production from his family business is carried through to Qi’s studio works where he has a prolific output of works and when seen together Qi’s sculptures can appear like a ‘crowd’ of forms that share a familiar aesthetic but are also individual in their own right.

Exhibition

The biggest curatorial decision with the Today Art Museum was to bring the atmosphere of the studio and workshop into the gallery to celebrate the skill and noise and physicality of making. We decided to include video of steel being hit, polished and bent, and to bring in the sounds of the workshop - a soundtrack of steel fabrication which fluctuated throughout the day. At one point Qi said he could recognise different colleagues from the studio by the ringing sound of their hammers. I really wanted to make the gallery space sound like a place of production and bring in photographs of the making process and show the heavy cast iron tools which have their own sculptural quality alongside the stages of Qi’s production from clay, to fibreglass to smaller works through to a ‘forest’ of the larger highly polished sculpture all lit with powerful lighting and dramatic shadows. I wanted to see if we could create the ‘theatricality’ of the workshop alongside the ‘poetry’ of the final large scale works and I think the Today Art Museum show really shows that creative journey.

Influences:

Qi’s sculpture has a strong sense of balance and form and his aesthetic language is influenced by the harmony of the natural world and a philosophical foundation of Taoism.

The Three Treasures underpin Qi’s work but he brings a contemporary and forward looking approach to his sculpture that is not only content with the comfort of historical references but seeks experiment and encourage new ways of thinking about art with a clear tradition in a 21st Century global art world.

Henry Moore redefined British sculpture in the 1950’s and 60s with a semi abstract form that developed from his drawings or people and landscape. Moore’s early fascination with carving shows both a physical challenge and a state of mental attitude.

’’to me carving direct became a religion….I like the fact that I begin with the block and have to find the sculpture inside it. You have to overcome the resistance of the material by sheer determination and hard work.”

Like Moore, Qi has a strong belief in craftsmanship and the process of sculpture where the essence of form is revealed through the process of making.

It should not be forgotten that Qi Yafeng is a maker of large and powerful sculpture and his five large works outside in the public realm around Today Art Museum literally reflect the growing contrast with sculpture and our increasingly systemised cities - the individual artist evolving creative ideas through sculpture against architecture and public space that is increasingly mass produced and designed for conformity. Where engineers and computer scientists might spend ages designing structures which can be generated with complex mathematics and algorithms an artist like Qi starts from a different perspective, with raw materials like ink, clay and plaster and an inner sense of form, proportion and balance.

One of the great qualities of Qi’s sculpture is his ability to work on a small and intimate scale and then to transform into larger works which have great potential as publicly commissioned sculpture. His calligraphic scripted pieces are an elegant transformation of the brushmark into sculptural 3-dimensional form and we were pleased to include some experimental ink drawings at the start of the exhibition which show the path that the sculptor has taken and the language of sculptural calligraphy which has evolved.

As British curator I have found it fascinating to work with contemporary Chinese artists and to think about different ways to present Qi’s work at Today Art Museum and how to bring out the essence of his artistic practice in a more international and contemporary art context. In 2016 it is very easy to think about artists’ work in a globalised context and an idea that things are very similar across different continents - especially with over 100 international art biennales where artists often presenting temporary installations, built by expo technicians – from my perspective I feel that Qi’s work and his sensibility as an artist is rooted in a deeper tradition of fine Chinese craft and Taoist concepts. As I have worked with Qi I have discovered a very contemporary artist yet one that has his developed his own pathway and that is not concerned with the changing fashions of contemporary art market but more focussed on the higher purpose of art to inspire and transcend.

Conclusion

Qi Yafeng is at a highly productive stage of his career where his extraordinary technical skills are working in balance with his spiritual focus and artistic sensibility. It is a special opportunity to review Qi’s extraordinary body of new work at a moment in time when he is becoming more widely known internationally. There is a sense with many of Qi’s sculptures that despite being abstract they also embody a human quality or an emotional attitude. This is as the heart of Qi’s skill and judgement as an artist and his consistent ability to produce sculpture which has a special clarity and purity of form but also a sculpture that speaks to our emotions and reflects our spiritual concerns.

Matthew Jarratt

June 2016