費里尼的小丑/女人/妻子

看費里尼的<大路>The Road (La Strada)，
是十二年前，在家中的小螢光幕。
那時，巨人huge，胸口好寬；小丑tiny，神情鬼馬。
那時，我愛上電影世界裏的馬戲團，著迷於浪跡天涯的藝人。

今年，有機會重看<大路>。是在大銀幕上。

發現，原來，巨人不是那麼巨大，胸口仍是強壯，但威武欠奉。
發現，原來，我也老了十二年；心情大不同了。

我看到的這個小丑，沒那麼嬌小。
她對主人(不一定是愛人) 不離不棄的忠誠，
竭力去關愛去成就他人的意志實在好大。
這個她，當不成巨人身邊的小丑(女人)。
她瘋了，被拋棄在寒風下的荒野。是淒涼，但不失尊嚴，她仍美麗。

老實說。
看<神遊茱麗葉>Juliet of the Spirits (Giulietta degli Spiriti)是難受的。
她，小丑不再是小丑，但戲還是演下去；
她不用跟著主人浪蕩，她是安守家中的師奶；
她被拋棄，拋棄在最舒適而華麗的家。

我以「小丑」作為的我心中的女性神話。破滅了。
這個妻子，馬仙娜（Giulietta Masina），不再美麗，而且顯然更淒涼。

Le Ballon rouge -- Albert Lamorisse

the first encounter with balloon


the 'heart-like' shadow of balloon


boy's red and girl's blue


balloon is not allowed on bus

slow, without destination

朋友提醒：慢無目的，正確是漫無目的。問我是否刻意。
我說不是，又錯白字。

後來想想，慢，也不錯。

慢 。slow。 無。without 。目的地。destination

像侯孝賢的＜红氣球之旅＞，红氣球，飄呀飄，雖是跌跌盪盪，也總能慢慢地，不著緊 ......隨著空間，隨著風，無所謂目的地。

電影是1956年法國導演Albert Lamorisse的短片"Red Balloon的變奏, 侯孝賢向Lamorisse致敬之作。

慢無目的地

在村上春樹<尋找漩渦貓的方法>裏，說到關於到外地寫小說的經驗；

「就這樣，集中精神寫小說時，生活就一貫變得單纯而規律。繁雜瑣事便漸漸從日常生活中排除出去。在日本時還難免會有各種雜務和交際，很難像這樣做到完全規律(要是勉强做的話顯得太不融通，不融通的話工作就會變得有一點難做)，人在外國的話這就有可能實現，對我幫助相當大。所以每次想寫長篇小說時，我就會不知不覺去到國外。如果要問我：「這樣嚴格而內向地過著孤獨的人生，到底有什麼樂趣呢？」，我也很傷腦筋，嗯，不過那也沒辦法。每個人都有不同的生活方式......。」

~~~~

最近與一位藝術家談到有關出外創作(通常是artist-in-residence)的事；他說去得多了，發現有點厭；長期這樣做作品也不是好事。他說地方很重要，以後他會看看那個地方與他本身創作的關係，才會去。

~~~~

回到村上的說法：在美國寫，和在日本寫，寫出來的小說不會不一樣。

~~~~

即使「嚴格而內向地過著孤獨的人生」，能集中而純綷地創作，處理的是生活需要的細節-----我想，到那裏都無所謂吧。

~~~~

其實，我希望繼續「慢無目的地」地上路。

平凡和不平凡

click to see

曾聽說過別人的評價(正確一點是批評)， 說我是不甘平凡的人。一直不以為然。

~~

從香港站長廊，你可站在平面電動帶，一路「目擊」的一個銀行廣告；有一些人的夢想云云...

~~

如果這些讓我看得目瞪口呆的廣告句子，代表了大衆普遍的聲音。(超碼廣告商認為這些能引起顧客共嗚。) (而有些夢想我的朋友也真的說過。)

~~

我想這就是香港平凡人的夢想。
~~
「平平凡凡咪好囉！做人最緊要開開心心。」--- 常聽到。
~~
平凡的定義被膚淺化。其實要真正做到平凡和真正做到不平凡，個人修養要好高；談何容易。
~~
在外地，常要介紹香港是如何如何一個地方，下次，我會試show這個 reference 。一目了然。

in fact i just stop somewhere

my friend N, we talked about "freeze"

remind me one day a cat looked at me from outside, through window.

5 mins. no freezing time. maybe time cannot be freezed.

cats know the rules. they look. they look at time as it is not the time. pretend it stops.
i don't think i will have a cat. they are stranger as i am. two strangers can never be worked out.
cats know the rules and don't tell a word.
i don't think i want a cat. they make solitary jokes.

在離開前，先回到不存在的家

Going Home
by Sophie Zelmani

Not very often have we met
But the music's been too bad
Can only sense happiness
if the music is sad

So, i'm going home
I must hurry home
Where a life goes on

We're too old to make a mess
Dreams will keep me young
Old enough to stress
Only mirrors tell the time

So, i'm going home
I must hurry home
Where a life goes on

Yes, I'm going home
Going home alone
And your life goes on

remember how to paint

get the paintings exhibited months ago. i have never seen them framed. looks great. so fresh. like new friends.

people with dog / people with cat

square man / round woman

perhaps, a book

days before, i talked with a master painter who was the first generation of the grantee of ACC fellowship. when he knew I will also go to The States next year, esp. in the days (3 months) in Headlands Center for the Arts, (as he thinks i have nothing to do there...:/) he suggested i should do some writing and make it a book published. when i was on my way back, i was thinking about the experience in Aland Archipelago. really hope i can have a book on that journey (might need to go back again....and visit more islands) . i think it would be great to include little piece of poem from the poet Katarina Gäddnäs and some images of works from the artist, Satu. they both live there.

那個Sunday的morning

月前的一個星期天(Sunday)，罕有的组合，兩男兩女，家是女的，位處鬧市；從星期六晚上一直到清早，鬧市的星期日，天剛亮，異常寧靜。從窗口眺望檔口的頂部，看不見貓；只見初早的透明光缐下，貓的家是潔淨亮麗的。那天說過的話，似乎都不太重要了。醉了的人，醒了，繼續安靜地處理事情。稿未寫完的，也是要趕及寫。

每星期都有一天Sunday，每一次Sunday，都有屬於那個Sunday的morning；

謝謝家的主人在那天屋內思絮一團槽的情景下，在那個Sunday的morning，放了經典「蕉碟」裏的Sunday Morning，像清水一樣的歌，可洗滌過夜後我那個沒有冲洗的身體。

Sunday morning, praise the dawning
Its just a restless feeling by my side
Early dawning, sunday morning
Its just the wasted years so close behind

Watch out, the worlds behind you
Theres always someone around you who will call
Its nothing at all

Sunday morning and Im falling
Ive got a feeling I dont want to know
Early dawning, sunday morning
Its all the streets you crossed, not so long ago

Watch out, the worlds behind you
Theres always someone around you who will call
Its nothing at all

Watch out, the worlds behind you
Theres always someone around you who will call
Its nothing at all

Sunday morning
Sunday morning
Sunday morning


今天在新屋裏的Sunday Morning，獨自一人，也是拉起了沒有洗澡的身軀，播着這歌(自從那次後我回家找來這只放在抽屜裏很久很久的CD)；看著只喝了幾口的啤酒罐無聊的站在牀邊；傻呵呵的我想到昨日不愉快的，大抵還是一堆執著；無論如何，得在星期天清早清洗一下。其實，肚子打著鼓(昨天沒吃飯了)，還是洗個澡、出門吃吃飯，看看這個新地方，比較實際吧！

Symbolic Logic of Alchemy - tribute to Lacan

in 2005, i did this work (in a group exhibition on the topic of all about 'cattle depot'), using Lacan's object a formula, apply on 'artist as alchemist'. it was a very strange work i had never done, that was text-based and theory-based without much material transformation. also in the work, it was set up a small piece of narrative about a piece of red brick (i found in cattle depot) - that, a prince (artist) trapped in an artist stone (the brick).

recently, i am thinking a piece of work and also want to use a more text-based appoach. taking out this Lacan piece might help.

My name is Luka....

Suzanne Vega 1988 -- Luka (acoustic)


與朋友說起近年發生在自己身上的一種隨著不安情緒而搬家的狀態---暫名為「強迫性搬遷焦慮症」。然後，試回憶童年經歷，看可有一些蛛絲馬跡。首先是有一年的晚上(我是大约五歲吧)，有外遇的爸，被媽拒諸門外；那個晚上，爸沒間斷的用木棍在屋外拷打著門。我在屋裏無知的聽著陌生的人奏著陌生的怒吼。人大點了，有年放學回家(可能是小學)，獨自一人；收到一個說是爸的男人打電話來，恐嚇說叫媽出街小心點，會對付她云云。到了初中，我家經歷了一次大規模走難式的搬遷 一家七口+一個B，由半山遷到山下的不足四百呎單位 。以我所知道的，也是為了徹底逃避爸。還記得第一晚整個新屋沒有一吋空位。一衆人在附近吃宵夜。

長大了，對 所謂「家」的空間，有某種obsession；兩年前终於搬離家。但因種種問題，一直沒法安定下來；最终，還是一味「離家」「搬家」。

沒法安定的心情，有些事沒法對別人盡說的狀況；我想起了Suzanne Vega 的Luka

Critics' Picks in ARTFORUM

http://artforum.com/picks/section=world&mode=past#picks18840

Hong Kong
"Restore"
1A SPACEUnit 14,Cattle Depot Artists Village,, 63 Ma Tau Kok Road, To Kwa Wan, Kowloon, October 4–November 4

“Restore” aims to bring together works that rethink and retell their creators’ “authentic experiences.” Absent, however, are the highly insular vocabularies one might expect in such art. Instead, even the show’s sparser—or more specific—pieces reference the larger-scale predicaments of Hong Kong culture. Wallace Chang Ping-hung’s sculptures, stacks of dim-sum steamers towering precariously above eye level, are humorous caricatures of bamboo and become heartbreaking when seen as futile postconsumption reconstructions of nature—perhaps an apt parallel to the local government’s conversion of compressed garbage into new land. The show’s most performance-oriented piece, Adrian Wong’s Bless All Ye Who Enter Here, 2007, includes exorcists who arrived on opening night to bless a space atop a ten-by-ten-foot platform constructed by the artist. With its accompanying red and green architectural structures and talismans, Wong’s piece might be a reversal of Tom Friedman’s iconic Untitled (A Curse), 1992, if Friedman’s activated, invisible sphere atop a pedestal were allowed cultural specificity and a mise-en-scène.

The works by Cornelia Erdmann and Ivy Ma both explore Hong Kong’s commercial development. Erdmann’s shoulder bags, labeled CATTLE DEPOT on their exteriors, reference the name of the gallery’s environs—a former cattle house repurposed by the government as an arts venue. Playing with the double meaning of branding, the bags are a sly conflation of two phenomena driven by herd instinct: Hong Kong’s designer-label shopping and the art world’s name-brand collecting. The most salient part of Ma’s installation is a wall drawing of a silhouetted edifice whose menacing form nonetheless betrays traces, in its unobscured mark-making, of a human creator. The piece’s whimsy comes from its installation: The titular quote, THE HOUSE'S ALWAYS THERE, wraps around a corner to include, via proximity, a strictly functional hole cut in the gallery’s wall for access to air-conditioning controls. These components, along with a square of green light projected onto a sixteen-by-sixteen-inch floor tile (a bereft, virtual approximation of a park), tell a familiar Hong Kong narrative in which humans, coming face to face with the Frankensteinian urban spaces they’ve made, respond with anxiety, adaptibility, and profitless attempts to create small, aesthetic oases within highly regimented space.

—Dawn Chan

象外詩情--韓志勳作品展

Conceptual Feeling beyond Images - The Works of Hon Chi-fun

Exhibition Period: 30/10/2007 - 9/12/2007
Opening Hours: 10am - 7pm Daily
Exhibition Venue: CityU Gallery, 6/F, Amenities Building, City University of Hong Kong

遷

攝於新居後窗

又搬遷，是沿著甚麼路缐
從收起到解開，是依據甚麼指引
鳥聲是洗刷的良方
垃圾堆中生出恐懼

又搬遷？我向我發問。
拆掉了再整合，於是洩露印記
每一次，房間裏看見陌生的鳥
然後，幾根野草長出了壞習性

又搬遷------誰可保證在路上沒有停頓時候
風吹過塵落下
咀裏發現一根毛髮
走上路，用力拔；踏著地，捲捲舌頭
從一個地方再去另一個地方

Review on Drawing practice . 4

2005, using hairpins again. pin by pin, one by one, inserting into foam surface. feeling like, stroke by stroke putting on drawing. at the end, some unexpected movement, forms.

Review on Drawing practice . 3

2005 in Bangladesh, I was making a playground (only a dark merry-go-round) in a room. I painted black grass near to the ground along the whole room, and four small drawings of tree/bird/cloud/waterfall.

Review on Drawing practice . 2

Also in UK (2002), the lines then became more tangible that possible to be held and arranged onto the space (in a room) .

Review on Drawing practice . 1

In UK (2001) , I did some drawings in a small sketch book. It focused on the lines' movement, and to 'flow' on/within/around a body figure. At that time, I hid myself in a small room or studio, and made some eccentric works.

模製與重組

Heidi Bucher 用自己家族的「祖屋」(巳荒廢了的) 完成她第一個關于「屋的皮膚」的作品。

地的紋理、窗的缐條、牆角的痕跡......全是她所熟悉的；
她把這些都「模製」了，把原來屬於室內的移到室外；
彷彿本來沒必要重組的，一旦離開了家，便要重組。
通過與屋的「肌膚之親」，她想起了婆婆，想起了小時侯在其中的生活。

我以為每個人都有自己的方式(也可說是儀式)去念記和緬懷他/她的空間。

Rooms Are Surroundings, Are Skins

The Swiss Avantgarde Artist Heidi Bucher (1926-1933)
all images taken from Art Adventures dvd, Heidi Bucher

how to fully take care of website, blog and facebook?

Curatorial Residencies in Helsinki

Helsinki International Curatorial Programme currently offers curatorial residencies in Helsinki for international visual arts curators. The programme is collaboration between HIAP - Helsinki International Artist-in-residence Programme and FRAME Finnish Fund for Art Exchange.

http://www.hiap.fi/newsletters/070912_curatorial_residencies/070912.html

觀遊 / i love zoo

與朋友說起，那種「觀遊」節目最喜歡；
馬戲班？ ------不愛小丑，和噴火的
遊樂場 ？------簡單有個盪鞦韆，兒時最愛
機動遊樂場？------自從有跳樓機，不敢玩；便失去玩其他的興趣
主題公園？------最好不是以電影作主題的
公園？-----有湖有樹的便最好

後來才醒覺，忘了說說動物園，其中我最愛水族館。

please leave me alone

Francis Bacon, Nude, 1960 / photo taken in MMK museum, 07

請收起笑顏
別向我點頭

變酸的奶 好想吐

那些富足，那些匱乏
不要借問
只願
留自己一點尊嚴

難奈一幕

要別過面

還有
遠難夢魘

願

到Schloss Wilhelmshöhe館 ，要向山上行；沿途有很多樹。
希望將到達Kassel的N，也會注意到那些令人著迷，穿過樹，而後落到地上的一圓圓光。
這些景象，會令人平靜。

time to work ...(hard?!)

逍遙自在的日子要完結了。
我成了朋友口中最奢侈的人---- 半年沒上班，六星期波羅的海島上生活，近二個月歐洲看看展覽博物館。
收拾心情有點困難。但知道要再動起來了。
我是幸運的。接下來的工作不算是排山倒海，還有些時間可進行創作。發表作品。

只是看著看著經遠洋運返的島上做的作品，感覺巳是非常抽離。

那些鳥那些小樹那些偶爾在我窗前走過的幾個人，離我好遠。

Petition for the immediate release of University teachers of Bangladesh

http://www.petitiononline.com/free657/petition.html

紮鐵工人的工作?

網上找到了資料 ---------

起樓嘅時候，一定會用到石屎嚟造牆，但係就咁落石屎嘅話，硬咗之後會好脆，所以落石屎之前要喺落石屎嘅地方加啲高拉力鐵，令出嚟嘅石屎更堅固，即係你見人拆樓嘅時候，啲爛牆中間伸出嚟嘅爛鐵枝，就係紮鐵嘅鐵。佢哋通常會用啲火燒過啲鐵線之後，綁住啲高拉力鐵，橫橫直直咁形成一個類似大嘅格仔網，網嘅兩邊釘好木板之後，就落石屎，等啲石屎硬咗之後就可以拆板，成幅牆就完成。

紮鐵工人叫Bar Bender & Fixer，Bar就係指啲長條鐵，Bender就係指啲屈曲物件嘅人，而Fixer就係指紮穩嘢嘅人囉。

photo taken in kokar island

The House

photo taken in kokar island

斜房子，開頂，陽光照面，宿夜地鹽，成風，從左邊到右邊。
斜房子，關頂，暗室微火，抖震輕慄，無聲，裡面，潮進。
開合，開合，每天。其實。不在我。

written by 樹上飛馬 (22Aug07)

drawing on the skin of a room

After several years using a flat in foo tak building as studio, it is recently i begin to love it, esp when looking at my own drawing together with some friends' drawing on the wall. Then, I always remember these friends. i hope i can leave more space in front of the wall, and let visiters/friends to draw more, to fill the whole wall. it is kind of intimacy, i think.

what does 'the surface' mean to me?

title: city surface / mixed media on wood / include clothes, card board, plaster, acrylic board, oil/acrylic/paint, ink, pieces of iron, sand...... /2000

there are always some works, i can never (i feel i can't) made some others similar again. like the above one. at that time i didn't think much on making a work, but always, a strong drive forced me to make everything by whatever materials on hand.

but seems the practice is changed (the drive was gone) and now, i don't know what the construction (by the materials/the paints) means to me.

building never speak

buildings never speak. they communicate (with the outside world) through human being. human being--a medium

啞空間 space never speak

(top row; from left to right)
1. a woman walk through the memorial (Berlin)
2. an installation work in a contemporary art museum (Frankfurt)
3. an orangutan sitting at the corner in a display room in a zoo (Berlin)
4. a couple in red walking through the trees in a park (Kassel)
5.
6.
7. hung bedspreads, someone standing behind a blue curtain (Venice/ Burano)
8.
9.

(bottom row; from left to right)
10.
11. someone standing in the river, two naked kids walking on the land over the river (Prague/Terezin)
12.
13.
14.

space never speak... then, how much can the one who take the photos speak for the space shown?

...............i try to describe..............

Robert Gober at Schaulager (Basel)

Slides of a Changing Painting

A perfect match of Rober Gober's work with Schaulager. clean, precise, contrasty materials

1976-2007 , all those washbasins, playpens, bundles of newspapers,
parts of the human body (such as legs or fragmentary torsos) ...

the above photo from Schaulager official website

水、水的流動，是Robert Gober 作品裏重要元素。
聖母脚底下流動的水，在其背後樓梯不絕流動的水；皮箱內的去水口；
又透過半掩門窺視房間中浴江裏那毛毛茸茸的腿......

我想起了蔡明亮電影裏的水的意象

走在平面的家

a drawing made during the stay in Kokar Island

懷舊房子的容貌
吃掉烈日間的鹽
他們說，請離去
我們的空間要消毒

走在平面的家
呆滯恍惚的面容
商場聖地如雪冷
沒頭沒腦的聳立

平面的家
我們學習
歪斜地進出