Monthly Archives: July 2020

Today’s Youth, Tomorrow’s World 明日世界的青春

July 8, 2020 2020年7月8日

Humanity has become enslaved by technology.

It’s not an easy fact to admit, considering the convenience afforded by technological innovations—whether it be artificial intelligence, big data, or fiber-optic speeds. Our tech-saturated world is making us more anxious and more stressed than ever before, but we’ve decided that these small sacrifices are worth it. Meanwhile, cyberviolence, misinformation campaigns, and privacy leaks have become the norm—hardly deserving of more than a 30-second news segment and few days worth of public outrage before the issue is forgotten. Unknowingly, the dystopic visions of sci-fi have become our reality.

The profound ways in which technology is shaping humanity and culture begs an important question: is it possible to safeguard ourselves against it? Taiwanese director Hsieh Yu-En doesn’t have an answer, but it’s a topic that weighs on his mind. In his films, he contemplates on the future we’re forging through our unhesitant embrace of technology. The dystopic narratives that he brings to life—eerily enough—often feel not that far off from reality. “I don’t look forward to the unknown future, but the unknown captivates my imagination,” he says. “To me, the future means infinite possibilities.”

不可否认，二十一世纪第三个十年的今天，人们的方方面面正在被科技捆绑。人工智能、超高速互联网生态、大数据……这些推动人类科技进步的产物却让我们自己变得被动。焦虑、孤单、社交恐惧、网络暴力、隐私泄漏等种种问题随之而来，好像科幻电影中描述的世界正走入我们的现实。你或许也一直在思考，身处这样的时代，我们究竟该以怎样一种方式去呈现属于我们自己的文化。来自台湾现居上海的导演谢宇恩（Yuen Hsieh）习惯以拥抱未来的创作手段直面当下亚洲青年群体，在世界还未被崩坏之前，用种种预言引发你对现实的思考。他说：“我对已知的并不期待，但总会对未知充满想象，因为未来总有很多可能。”

Hsieh’s speculative fiction is often grounded in present-day reality. In Loveless with Roland, he presents an alternate-universe Tokyo, one in which love has become a coveted commodity. In it, citizens have “love credits” that are tracked by the government, which when depleted, makes them unable to experience love. The three-minute short follows Roland, a seedy loan shark in Shinjuku who’ll happily provide these virtual credits to those who’ve run out. Through Hsieh’s heavy-handed editing, he drives the bleak story along at a whirlwind pace. As farfetched as the story may seem on the initial watch, perhaps there are more parallels between the film and real life than we’d like to admit—after all, the role of Roland is played by one of the highest-paid gigolos in Japan.

在虚拟的日本东京，当地政府通过了 “人类优良计画” —— 指通过大数据的形式，记录每位市民的 “爱情信用积分”。那些信用积分破产的人们被称作 “爱情失能”，并被规定不得与真人恋爱，他们来到新宿歌舞伎町，寻找与 “爱情失能救世主 Roland” 的私密邂逅，故事就此展开。这部名为 《LOVELESS WITH ROLAND》的短片时长不到三分钟，导演采用多个场景，用梦幻与未来感十足的特效处理，带我们瞥见虚构社会中的灰色地带。影片的故事设定虽然不存在，但却由日本第一男艺伎 Roland 真人扮演，反映出现实社会普世价值观与私人欲望之间的冲突。

 

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This intermingling of reality and fiction is prevalent throughout Hsieh’s works, often made especially convincing through actors who reprise the role of themselves in a parallel reality. Notable Chinese celebrities, such as MC Jin, Aaron Liu, and Chris Lee, and renowned artists such as John Yuyi and Lu Yang have all starred in his films. Ordinary people of different backgrounds, ages, genders, and worldly outlooks are just as likely to be the leading man or leading lady in Hsieh’s cinematic universes though. “My films are for everyone,” Hsieh says. “I simply propose a possible vision of the future and different viewers can make of it what they will.”

这种虚拟与现实相结合的创作手法，一直贯穿于谢宇恩的作品中，搭配当代青年视角里的审美标准，电子游戏、低保真、赛博朋克、反乌托邦甚至二次元等元素爆炸式地呈现在观众面前。视频的主角有像 MC JIN、刘亚仁、李宇春等公众人物；也有 John Yuyi、Lu Yang 等新时代艺术家；更有生活在我们身边的角色。他们来自不同的职业，年龄和性别，对生活有着各自的观点，讲述不为人知的故事。当谈论到视频的受众时，谢宇恩说：“我的视频面向所有人，提出一个可能的未来，供所有群体去遥想。”

 

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Despite his accomplishments, Hsieh wasn’t exactly a model student in school. He was an especially rebellious teenager in middle school and high school, often skipping classes and blowing off homework to read manga and play video games. Acting out was his way of protesting against the unengaging curriculum. “I actually wanted to be a manga artist when I was young,” he recalls. “In class, I drew cartoons all over the pages of my math textbook.” Though his comics-art aspirations were never fulfilled, his interest in storytelling was eventually realized through filmmaking. And based on his films, it’s clear that his passion for manga and video games hasn’t wavered.

Hsieh graduated with a bachelor’s degree in graphic design at Central St. Martins, and his official induction into the world of filmmaking was at the Royal College of Art, where he received his master’s. During his university years, Hsieh enjoyed sitting in on classes he wasn’t enrolled in. “The opportunity to listen in on these different courses helped me widen my perspective and mind,” he says. “The most valuable lessons I learned in the UK were how to ask questions, how to be critical, and be adaptive.”

He considers his graduation project, a low-budget sci-fi flick, to be an important cornerstone in his creative journey. It helped set the foundation for the directorial style he’s now known for and marked the beginnings of his fascination with technology and the future.

中学时代的谢宇恩曾经是一名叛逆少年，高中时期的他常常以看漫画和打电动作为对抗精英教育的方式，他认为长大后如果能在爱好上获得成功，会是一件很酷的事情。他说：“其实我小时候的梦想是成为漫画家, 每天都会在数学本上画几篇八宫格漫画出来。” 多年过后，谢宇恩虽然未能成为一名漫画家，但却在视频领域获得不少关注。 在他如今不少作品中，你依然能感受到多年来对漫画和游戏的热情。

真正接触到视频制作是在大学时期，谢宇恩先后就读了中央圣马丁的平面设计专业和皇家艺术学院的影像专业。当时对传统的授课方式并不是很感冒的他，经常穿梭于各类学科的课堂，他说：“跨系学习的机会给了我很多不同的思考角度。质疑、批判、改变是我在英国的最大收获。” 在经历了不断挖掘自我之后，毕业那一年，谢宇恩选择用一部低成本科幻片完成毕设。从那时起，科技和未来等词语便逐渐成为他作品的关键字眼。

 

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The majority of Hsieh’s films are rooted in fiction, but Taiwanese culture was a clear influence in his sophomoric works. In earlier commercial projects, such as Eataipei and Xiu Long, he captures Taiwan with a unique directorial style that blurs the line between the future and the present. Through well-chosen locations, neon-lit lighting, and rapid cuts, these two films present powerful portraits of the island and its inhabitants. His now-signature aesthetics—heavily informed by cyberpunk, video game, lo-fi art, and Japanese anime—began to solidify around this time.

虽说谢宇恩的作品大多来自天马行空幻想，但他也难以掩饰对自身文化符号的重视。在他早期的作品《Eataipei》和《修龙》中，台湾本土多元文化与个人风格相辅相成，构成一副传统与未来相碰的纷繁画面。两支视频在高速流转的光影中汇集形形色色的人群，谢宇恩通过不同的场景与镜头风格来体现不同人物的个性，这些为他日后的视频风格奠定了基础。

 

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Hsieh’s films are often a cacophony of sensory impressions. Though his visual style is typically what first comes to mind, the sound design and score are equally important to his work, their inclusion adding a taut energy that keeps viewers immersed in his worlds. Considering Hsieh’s self-professed love of music, this emphasis on the sonic components of his films isn’t all that surprising—in his free time, he’s an avid club-goer and even DJs occasionally.

He’s worked with a number of renowned music producers from around the world, including Air Max ’97,  Tzusing, YenTech, Hyph11E, Alex Wang, 33EMYBW, and more. “I’m heavily inspired by East coast hip-hop and Detroit techno,” Hsieh says. “The musicians who made these types of music carry the same sense of freedom and rebelliousness that I want to convey in my films.”

经历了不断跨界与融合，谢宇恩的视频如同一场视觉的文化盛宴呈现在我们眼前。而音乐也作为重要的一部分出现在他的作品中。从说唱到地下电子音乐，几乎所有视频都由激动人心的声音贯穿始终，不乏有 Air Max ’97、 Tzusing、YenTech、Hyph11E、Alex Wang、33EMYBW 等优秀地下音乐人的作品。谢宇恩说：“纽约嘻哈和底特律 Techno 对我很有启发，这些音乐人身上往往带有一种 ‘自由’ 和 ‘叛逆’ 的精神，这些精神能够伴随影像传递给观众。” 而在平日没有拍摄项目的时间里，谢宇恩也经常光顾地下俱乐部并作为 DJ 参与其中。

 

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Hsieh enjoys the collaborative process, and most of his projects are created alongside close friends. This affinity for collaboration has led to a number of creative breakthroughs. In 2019, a collaborative project with three music producers and three 3-D artists resulted in Second Life 2.0, an exhibition for virtual gallery Slime Engine that examined issues of gender and racial inequality. The project inspired Hsieh to create Legends of Dystopiasian, a spinoff of Second Life 2.0; this would also be the first time he used 3-D animation in his own work. In it, familiar figures of Chinese mythology—such as Sun Wukong, Nezha, and Mulan—are reimagined as futuristic warriors. “These mythical characters represent fearlessness,” he says. “They’ve arrived in the present day to take on societal, gender, and racial inequality.”

目前，谢宇恩已来上海三年多的时间，在上海快速更新的城市节奏下，谢宇恩认识了不少志同道合的朋友，这同时为他带来更多尝试的机会。一年前的 “史莱姆引擎（Slime Engine）” 的线上虚拟机构中，谢宇恩与三位 3D 艺术家及三位音乐人共同完成了 《Second Life 2.0》项目。不以往不同，该项目运用了大量 3D 动画技术，在一个完全虚拟的背景和画面里探讨了打破种族，性别的现实议题。这样的创作思路对谢宇恩带来了很大的启发，以至于后来制作了另一部全 3D 作品《末世神话 (LEGENDS OF DYSTOPIASIAN)》对《Second Life 2.0》进行了延续。作品将我们熟悉的孙悟空、哪吒、花木兰等神话角色进行了未来设定，谢宇恩说：“三位神话角色代表着无惧的自我姿态，他们来到现代，尝试挑战强权、性别与种族平权等种种议题。”

 

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Though Hsieh enjoys working on non-commercial films that test his creative boundaries, he’s no stranger to client work, as evidenced by a body of work rife with commissions from high-profile brands like Nike, Rayban, Adidas, and more. Though they’re commercial projects, these films have often gone viral, and their success has spawned copycats eager to replicate Hsieh’s distinct visual style. The imitators don’t bother him though. “Any form of art that doesn’t communicate the artist’s own values and beliefs isn’t true art,” he shrugs.

创作多年以来，谢宇恩的作品在网络上广泛传播。曾有不少品牌前来与谢宇恩合作，有像 Nike、Ray Ban、Adidas 这样备受年轻人喜爱的品牌，更有不少当代火热的青年文化平台。甚至近些年有很多类似的视频风格纷纷出现，不过对他来说：“任何艺术形式，如果没有透过内容表述自己的价值与信仰, 内核就无法被传递。” 

Mulan in Legends of Dystopiasian
Nezha in Legends of Dystopiasian
Sun Wukong in Legends of Dystopiasian

As a director who’s worked across Asia, Hsieh has met young creative leaders and trend makers from around the region. It’s led him to turn his attention towards Asian youth culture. “Youth culture is idolized because young people are fearless, rebellious, filled with angst; they strive to be free and they have an attitude,” he explains. “It’s a culture that fascinates people, including myself.”

The evolution of Asian youth culture and how its spread has been amplified by the internet’s global reach has been of particular interest to him. As with the youth culture of any region—artists, musicians, and designers are key to its dissemination and reception, and Hsieh’s work is contributing to this diffusion. “The internet is bringing Asian youth culture to the world,” he says. “As with any movement, there will be pioneers and trailblazers who people might not immediately ‘get,’ but time will vindicate them.”

As big of a role as the internet and technology have played in propagating youth culture, they—at the same time—may be tainting it through homogenization. In this regard, many of Hsieh’s films can also be viewed as time capsules of sorts for today’s Asian youth, unimpeachable caches of lights, colors, and sounds that capture the aesthetics, outlooks, and beliefs of young Asians in the here and now. “There’s nothing to be scared of,” Hsieh says. “We are the future.”

透过近年的拍摄项目，谢宇恩接触了大量青春的题材，遇到了各种各样的年轻人。渐渐地，他的目光对准了亚洲地区青年文化上面。他说：“很多青年文化的魅力都来自最当初的那种 ‘无惧’、’叛逆’、’愤怒’、’自由’、’张狂’。这些文化产物正在吸引越来越多的人，同样也吸引我。”

随着互联网的繁荣，亚洲地区的青年文化逐渐在世界的浪潮中占有一席之地。在线上的世界里，艺术家、音乐人、设计师成为当代传播本土文化的关键角色。而谢宇恩的作品本身就是一种强有力的传播方式，他认为：“亚洲青年文化正在透过网络辐射至全球，因此会出现一些先锋的、脱离常规的人群出现，需要一段时间才能让人去理解并接受。”

我们不确定未来究竟是怎样的，但在可以确定的是，谢宇恩正用一种超前的视觉形式奋力展现青年文化。这不是对抗未来的形式，而更像是一种在不断反思与颠覆中延续与守护的方式。那些不甘心被时代抹去的我们被映刻在光影中，连同丰富的视觉元素，呈现极富有爆发力的大场面。这股力量来自青春，也来源于活出自我的勇气。

对于这个时代，谢宇恩想说：“没什么好怕的，因为未来属于我们！”

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Website: www.yuen-hsieh.com
Instagram: @yuenhsieh
Vimeo: ~/yuehhsiehstudio

 

Contributor: Pete Zhang

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网站: www.yuen-hsieh.com
Instagram: @yuenhsieh
Vimeo: ~/yuehhsiehstudio

 

供稿人: Pete Zhang

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No Man’s Land 废墟上的狂欢

July 7, 2020 2020年7月7日

You veer off a busy street and walk through an empty parking lot littered with debris. The noise of traffic disappears as you step deeper into a dark alleyway. You knock on a nondescript metal door and a doorman emerges to check for your name on a list. Behind him, music thumps from within. He lets you enter, and turning the corner, you’re immediately hit with aggressive barrages of electronic dance music. In the dead center of one room, a ceiling is partially caved in and the cascade of rainwater falling through almost looks like an art installation. Projections flutter on walls in glitchy black, white, and red, while lasers plaster intricate patterns on the walls full of gaping holes; and Egyptian-themed artwork leftover from the space’s former life as a commercial nightclub can still be found throughout. This is No Man’s Land, a rave organized by Jakarta’s Slowdeath Mobile crew.

从喧闹的街道转身步入满是杂物的荒废停车场，穿过一条昏暗的小巷，汽车噪音在耳边渐渐消失。一扇不起眼的金属门立在面前，听到敲门声的守卫打开大门，在他身后，传来了砰砰作响的低音。进门前需要在名单上确认你的名字，转眼间，你会被气势汹涌的电子舞曲所包围。在房间的正中位置，部分天花板稍稍塌陷，滴落的雨水让整个空间看上去像是一个大型的装置艺术。投影仪的光束拍打在坑洼不平的墙面上，用黑、白、红投放着近乎故障的复杂视觉效果。四处看看，你还会看到埃及主题艺术品，它们是曾经商业俱乐部遗留下来摆设。这里是 “No Man’s Land”，是由雅加达 Slowdeath Mobile 团队组织的一场电子音乐派对。

Ofri at No Man's Land

“When we were finished setting up in the space, it reminded me of a zombie; technically still dead, but risen to serve a greater purpose,” laughs the founder of Slowdeath Mobile, a mysterious individual who prefers to go by Monkey Man. There were about 100 people of all types in attendance, ranging from punks dressed in leather, to prep kids in smart-casual wear, to more daring, fashion-conscious types. Any type of electronic music is welcome, but they tend to stick to sounds shunned by mainstream clubs such as experimental, breakcore, gabber, and techno. For the past year and a half, Slowdeath has hosted half a dozen of these illicit raves, popping up in spaces like shuttered clubs and empty restaurants. The team, which consists of six people, finely curates music, art, visuals, and the crowd for a holistic experience. They also frequently partner with Convert Textured and Blanco Benz Atelier, two art collectives who handle event visuals and art exhibitions.

“布置完整个空间后，这个地方让我想人死而复生的传说；其实原本已经荒废，现在却又重新站了起来，有了新的用途。” Slowdeath Mobile 创始人笑着说道，一个自称为 Monkey Man 的神秘人。来参加派对有上百人，他们形形色色，有身穿皮革套装的朋克仔、有一身醒目休闲服的年轻人、也有造型大胆的新新人类。这里欢迎任何类型的电子音乐，但更倾向于不同于主流俱乐部的地下音乐，比如实验（Experimental）、碎拍核（Breakcore）、超速舞曲（Gabber） 和铁克诺（Techno）音乐。在过去的一年半中，Slowdeath 曾举办过六场这样的地下电子音乐派对，每次活动会在一些废弃俱乐部或餐馆里举办。该团队由六人组成，他们为舞客们精心策划音乐、艺术以及视觉效果，可谓一套全方位的派对体验。

Xin Lie at No Man's Land

The illegal rave scene can be traced back to the 1980s and have been central to the development of several electronic music scenes. Detroit techno was born in the abandoned warehouses left behind by fleeing industry; German techno blossomed in the empty East Berlin homes newly accessible by the collapse of the Berlin Wall; and in England, acid-house parties marked the Second Summer of Love, which then developed into raves that sprawled across the rural hinterlands—many even practiced Anarchist ideas of social organization like the temporary autonomous zone.

Slowdeath is directly inspired by this rich history and applies it to the unique circumstances of their country. “In a place like Indonesia, you’ve got religious fundamentalism at one extreme and the fatigue of paralyzing work hours in the name of vast consumerism at another,” says the founder. “Established venues are capitalist ventures whose sole purpose is to make as much profit as possible, commodifying artists and exploiting newness in pursuit of a fat income stream. They’re relentlessly targeting youth with various new products in the rampant pursuit of profit.”

地下电子音乐派对最早可以追溯到 1980 年代的芝加哥浩室（Chicago House）和底特律铁科诺（Detroit Techno）音乐，那段时期对电子音乐的发展至今都仍有非常重要影响。而底特律铁科诺（Detroit Techno）本身就诞生于当地工业撤走后留下的废弃仓库中。当酸性浩室（Acid House）漂洋过海来到英国，焕发了当地 “爱的第二个夏天（Second Summer of Love）”，引发了数场对抗政府、爱与和平的 “锐舞”（Rave）派对；而柏林墙倒塌后，人们得以进入那些闲置的东柏林房屋尽情摇摆，德国铁科诺、出神（Trance）由此蓬勃发展。这些历史成为了 Slowdeath 的灵感启发，并被他们应用于本地的电音发展。Monkey Man 说：“在印度尼西亚这样的地方，一方面是激进的宗教原教旨主义，另一方面是普遍的消费主义导致的无休止的营业。好的商业场所都是资本主义企业，他们的唯一目标就是获取尽可能多的利润，将艺术家商品化，为了赚钱，一味追求新奇，不断向年轻人推出各种新产品，只为了疯狂赚取利润。”

Rully Shabara at No Man's Land

In the face of all this, Slowdeath asked themselves this: why not underground raves? Why not a liberated zone? Why not a free party? Slowdeath is meant to harbor outcasts and nurture alternative ideas. “We’re creating a different reality where the possibility of a pure and new idea could be born in the not so distant future,” says Monkey Man. “We want to discover what’s possible in the absence of a transactional environment.” In the rave, anything they imagine is brought to life, if only for a night. “It’s a participatory act between the performer and the audience where they craft their own reality.”

面对这一切，Monkey Man 心想为什么自己不能举办地下的电音派对呢？为什么不能开设一个完全开放的空间，供大家免费跳舞？Slowdeath 的宗旨是接纳社会上的各类人群，为独特的想法提供平台。他说：“我们提供了现实的另一种可能，为那些蓄势待发的创意提供一个孵化的场地。想看看，没有商业交易的环境会带来怎样的可能性。”在派对中，他们想尽办法将想法变为现实，即便只有一个晚上的时间来发挥。“这是表演者和观众的共同参与的活动，由他们打造属于自己的时空。”

Kuntari at No Man's Land

The physical realities of hyper-dense Southeast Asian cities pose their own challenges that are distinct from the West where the illegal rave was born. “In Indonesia, especially big cities like Jakarta, there’s no place that’s really abandoned,” Monkey Man says. “There’s always someone keeping an eye on the place. But they’re not formal security guards, they’re often more like territorial thugs. We call them preman, and an organized group of them are called ormas.”

To throw their events, the Slowdeath team needs to earn the trust of whichever premans are guarding the space they’re eyeing. they actually relish this part of the process, saying that it forces them to interact with people beyond the art world. “As artists, we tend to be so focused on ourselves that we slowly grow detached from real people. We’re so good at crafting art but so dull when it comes to dealing with real people. We’ve become elitist, placing art above people.” 

不同于欧美那些地下派对的起源地，高人口密度的东南亚城市面临着截然不同的挑战。Monkey Man 说：“在印尼，尤其是像雅加达这样的大城市，很难找到完全荒废的场所，每个地方都会有人看守。很多时间，这些人并不是什么保安人员，而是一些抢占地盘的黑帮混混，我们称他们为 ‘preman’，有组织者的黑帮团体叫做 ‘ormas’。”

要举办活动，Slowdeath 团队就要获得这些看守地盘的黑帮的信任。Monkey Man 实际上很喜欢这个过程，因为这迫使他们与艺术圈以外的人互动。“艺术家常常过于专注于自我，以至于逐渐脱离现实世界中的其他人。我们擅长艺术创作，但与其他人打交道时却很笨拙。这样的艺术家已经变成社会的精英人士，将艺术置于人们之上。”

The ability to sidestep commercial and social restraints to independently curate ideas, aesthetics, and values is one of the most liberating aspects about these types of scenes and events. But there are real risks in the pursuit of this freedom, and it’s impossible to sidestep reality entirely. The police pose a very serious risk. And if organizers are not careful, lives are at risk as well. In California, dozens died in the Ghost Ship fire, and in Brooklyn, it turned out a warehouse was contaminated by toxic waste. It’s not to be taken lightly. 

“People risk themselves to be a part of this because it’s profound, there’s a reward beyond profit,” says the founder. “There’s a deeper personal meaning here and a growing sense of community”

对于这些地下派对和活动来说，最自由的地方在于规避商业和社会的限制，独立策划各种创意、美学和价值观。但是追求这种自由也伴随着一定的风险，且不可能完全脱离现实。譬如一个很大的威胁就是警察。另外，如果组织者不够谨慎，也可能导致人身安全的问题。在加利福尼亚， “幽灵船”（Ghost Ship）活动现场曾有数十人在大火中丧生；在布鲁克林，有一个仓库曾被有毒废物污染，不少人为此付出代价。所以绝对不能掉以轻心。

Ayudhia 说：“人们之所以冒着危险来参加我们的派对，是因为这些派对他们来说具有非凡的意义，他们可以获得金钱以外的收获。有更多人在这里找到属于他们的意义，同时一股愈发强烈的社区感正在进一步蔓延。”

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Website: www.slowdeathmobile.com
Instagram: @slowdeathmobile

 

Contributor: Mike Steyels
Chinese Translation: Olivia Li
Images Courtesy of Slowdeath Mobile

喜欢我们的故事？欢迎关注我们 Neocha 的微博与微信。

 

网站: www.slowdeathmobile.com
Instagram: @slowdeathmobile

 

供稿人: Mike Steyels
英译中: Olivia Li
图片由 Slowdeath Mobile 提供

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Inside Out 我的自白书

July 6, 2020 2020年7月6日

Inside Tinsideout’s silken dreamscapes, viewers are met by the colorful cast of chimeric creatures who inhabit his imagination. These character collages—from antler-sprouting humans to a melting lump of flesh—are mutant offsprings born from the artist’s interpretation of the collective unconscious, which, as proposed by Carl Jung, house knowledge of symbols and imagery that are universally recognizable.

“My practice is to use the portrait genre as a canvas to stretch ideas about identity,” he says. It is through the revelatory art of portraiture that Tinsideout—whose real name is Tran Nguyen Trung Tin—found his identity as a visual artist. The moniker Tinsideout is as much about self-expression as it is about his quest to illustrate the interior of the psyche.

在 Tinsideout 创作的绢画所筑造的梦境里，各种想象的奇妙生物幻化而生。从长出鹿角的人类到融化的肉堆，这些千奇百怪的角色脱胎于 Tinsideout 对“集体无意识”的理解。“集体无意识”这个概念即人类所普遍认同的符号和图像，由心理学家卡尔·荣格（Carl Jung）提出。

Tinsideout 说：“创作肖像画是我探索身份认同的一种方式。”原名为 Tran Nguyen Trung 的他，正是通过启发性的肖像画艺术，找到了自己作为视觉艺术家的身份。Tinsideout 这个名字既是一种自我身份表达，也代表着他对于大胆出柜、呈现真实自我的追求。

In college, Tran found himself captivated by the endless possibilities of silk early on. He graduated with a degree in silk painting before going to the UK for his master’s in art. Vietnamese silk painting—which flourished under French colonialism—combines the finessed watercolor techniques of Europe and its love for genre art with the country’s artistic traditions. Unlike silk painting traditions in China and feudal Japan, which used inks and colors made from soot or minerals and depicted the royal court or landscapes, Vietnamese silk paintings favor scenes from everyday life. Their poetic and languid qualities have been the subject of much praise.

读大学的时候，Tinsideout 开始热衷于探索丝绸的艺术创作可能性，并在毕业时获得了绢画艺术的学位。越南绢画在法国殖民时期蓬勃发展，出色融合了欧洲精美的水彩技艺、对风俗画艺术的热爱以及越南当地的艺术传统。在中国和封建时代的日本，传统绢画通常是使用烟灰或矿物制成的墨水和颜料描绘皇室或风景；而越南的传统绢画则偏爱描绘日常的生活场景，其诗情画意与慵懒惬意的风格一直备受赞誉。

Just as brushstrokes build upon the previous ones to form something beautiful in traditional painting, silk painters build on tradition. Over the years, Tran has made his focal point the ethereal quality of organza silk, experimenting with how to push its limits. Instead of painting on one single layer before mounting it on paper, Tran paints on three and forgoes the paper backing. The result is his signature style of triple-layer silk paintings, first of their kind in terms of technique. Without the solid paper, the diaphanous layers take on a luminous sfumato quality, blurring the lines between the seen and the imagined.

正如绘画通过对过往经典的再度诠释一样，绢画艺术家也在传统的基础上进行改良。多年来，Tinsideout 一直着眼于透明硬纱丝绸的空灵风格，尝试创新突破。他没有选择在单层面料上绘画再贴于纸上，而是放弃纸背衬，选择在三层面料上绘画，最终形成他标志性的三层绢画作品，从工艺上来讲，这是史无前例的。没有了纸背衬，层叠的透明丝绸呈现出绚目的晕染效果，模糊了现实与想象之间的界线。

In Beauté-Faux, a collection of nine silk paintings, Tran reimagines body parts as nine interconnected fictional characters, of which The Brain is the central figure. Tran’s accompanying narrative mirrors the wretched passions of life: The Heart, a woman with her back turned, is the mother who constantly reminds The Brain of his origin. The Testicles, described as “vicious and passive-aggressive,” turns lust and longing into feelings of unworthiness. Though veiled by metaphors, Tran’s art is confessional, emoting a complex inner life that resonates universally.

在由 9 张绢画组成的《Beauté-Faux》系列中，Tinsideout 将身体的不同部位变成 9 个相互关联的虚构角色，其中“大脑”是中心人物。在随附的文案中，他描写了生活的一些不幸的情感：背过身的“心脏”扮演着母亲的角色，不断提醒着“大脑”的身世起源；“邪恶而被动攻击型”的“睾丸”将欲望和渴望变成卑劣的感觉。尽管他的艺术充满隐喻，却又是一种自白，揭示着每个人心中的复杂内心世界。

Together, the series is a self-portrait in nine parts. The imagery of Beauté-Faux delves into the surreal terrains of Tran’s imagination and shines a psychoanalytic light inwards. “This is an attempt to question and reconsider my own thoughts and memories, as the mind can sometimes make up unreal memories, so real that you actually thought they did happen,” he says.

Questioning his own past, Tran wrestles with whether or not his memory is a reliable narrator. To what extent is the haze of our memory tinted by yearning and emotions? Was it beautiful because we wanted it to be good?

These are the questions to which Tran hopes the process of making art may provide an answer. In turning himself inside out and placing his findings for all to view, he illustrates a complex and ever-fascinating subject: how our different inner selves affect our perception of the external world.

《Beauté-Faux》系列如同是九幅画组成的自画像，深入剖析了 Tinsideout 的虚幻想象，照亮其内心的世界。他说：“我希望通过这种方式，去质疑和重新思考我自己内心的想法和回忆，因为内心有时也会虚构出不真实的记忆，但这些记忆感觉如此真实，以致于你会以为它们真实发生过。”

Tinsideout 质疑着自己过往的记忆，为这些回忆的真实性而苦恼。我们的记忆在多大程度上受到渴望和情感的影响？回忆之所以美好，只是因为我们内心希望如此吗？他希望通过艺术创作找到这些问题的答案。因而，Tinsideout 剖析自己的内心，将想法袒露出来，在绢画作品中传达一个复杂而又引人入胜的主题：每个人内心所拥有的、不同的自我，以及它们如何影响我们对外部世界的认知。

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Website: www.tinsideout.xyz
Instagram: @tinsideoutxyz

 

Contributor: Lace Nguyen
Chinese Translation: Olivia Li

喜欢我们的故事？欢迎关注我们 Neocha 的微博与微信。

 

网站: www.tinsideout.xyz
Instagram: @tinsideoutxyz

 

供稿人: Lace Nguyen
英译中: Olivia Li

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Illusive Life 一百种球形情绪

July 6, 2020 2020年7月6日

Through gesticulation, verbalization, and facial expressions, we make our emotions recognizable. But without the medium of human bodies, what would they look like? Multidisciplinary designer Sumangla Bishnoi‘s poster series, Illusive Life, proposes an answer. In it, she depicts emotional states as an orb drifting through various black-and-white abstractions.

我们通过手势、言语和面部表情来表达情绪，但是如果没有了身体这个媒介，情绪又会是什么样子的？多领域设计师 Sumangla Bishnoi 的海报系列《Illusive Life》（幻象人生）给出了答案，将不同的情绪描绘成一颗颗球体，悬浮于黑白虚幻场景。

For fear, the sphere sits precariously on a cliff’s edge, paralyzed by worries of plunging into the unknown. Anger appears on an all-black page with the ball off-kilter in composition, and around it, lines chaotically shred through the page in an agitated frenzy. Pride shows the sphere encased within a cinched grid, the sliver of space that it rests in a metaphor for the narrow confines of an inflated ego.

在“恐惧”中，球体在悬崖边缘摇摇欲坠，像是担心会跌落未知的深渊而不敢动弹；而“愤怒”则是全黑的背景上涂满了狂乱的白线，像要将画面撕碎一般，而小球悬在图片的中下部毫无着落；在“傲慢”里，球体夹在封闭的网格中，压缩的空间隐喻着妄自尊大导致的狭隘。

Aside from the designs, collaborator Akshay Gupta provided vivid backstories for each emotion with simple one-liners. In Selflessness, the accompanying text paints a picture of a compassionate mother; in Joy, Gupta captures the happiness of having supportive friends; and in Curiosity, the caption speaks to the importance of having an inquisitive mind. With this additional context, Bishnoi’s evocative designs are pegged to real, relatable experiences.

除了这些视觉元素外，一起创作的 Akshay Gupta 还为每一种情绪撰写了充满诗意的旁白注解，为画面增添故事感。在“无私”的注解中，描写了母亲的慈悲之心；在“喜悦”中，Akshay 讲述了有支持自己的朋友所带来的快乐；在“好奇”中，则表达了保持好奇心的重要性。对字词的故事性解读，让 Sumangla 抽象的视觉画面更能和观众产生共鸣。

Bishnoi’s posters showcase the range of our emotional spectrum, focusing even on the difficult emotions that many prefer to push aside. By embracing the good with the bad, she celebrates what it means to be human.

“Emotions, I believe, are the things that make us feel most alive,” she says. “They make us who we are. . . They drive our behavior and values every day, every second. Yet they are abstract and intangible.”

Sumangla 的海报作品虽然简单，却令人回味无穷，展示了一系列的人类情绪，以及在生命不同阶段出现的不同情感。

她说：“我认为有了情绪，人才会意识到自己是活着的。情绪让我们成为了自己。虽然情绪是无形的，却又会无时无刻地影响我们的行为与价值观。”

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Website: www.sumanglabishnoi.com
Instagram: @sumangla_designature
Behance: ~/SumanglaBishnoi

 

Contributor: David Yen
Chinese Translation: Olivia Li

喜欢我们的故事？欢迎关注我们 Neocha 的微博与微信。

 

网站: www.sumanglabishnoi.com
Instagram: @sumangla_designature
Behance: ~/SumanglaBishnoi

 

供稿人: David Yen
英译中: Olivia Li

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Strings Attached 梦魇、傀儡与人

July 1, 2020 2020年7月1日

The world of Zeen Chin is one filled with animated marionettes, eerie masks, and impish demons. These characters switch roles often—at times, one might be tugged along by strings, while other scenes might show them as the puppeteer. These strings, pulling his characters along every which way, pose a fairly straightforward question: does free will truly exist, or is it just an illusion?

Zeen Chin 的作品充满各种木偶、怪异面具和恶魔的角色，而且这些角色还会经常变换身份：有时是被操纵的提线木偶，而有时又变成操纵这些傀儡的人。这些拉扯着木偶的细线令人不禁思考着一个尖锐的问题：自由意志真的存在吗？抑或仅仅是一种幻想？

Zeen, whose real name is Chin Jing-hui, is working on this series of illustrations for a forthcoming art book titled 21. Throughout these works, the Chinese-Malaysian artist culls inspiration from his heritage: Chinese puppet theatre, Buddhist and Taoist references, and other Southeast Asian folklore all make frequent appearances in his drawings. “These are all things I grew up with,” he says. “It’s just natural to include them in my work.”

马来华裔艺术家 Zeen 原名陈景辉，这是他为自己即将出版的画册《21》所创作的一系列插图。在创作这些作品时，他的灵感主要源自中国传统的木偶戏剧、佛教和道教文化，以及其他东南亚民间传说，“我从小在这些文化中长大，所以很自然会想到用来做创作的素材。”他说道。

Currently based in Kuala Lumpur, Zeen says the diversity of Malaysian culture is an endless source of inspiration. Even though much of his focus is on Chinese culture, as viewed through the prism of his childhood in Malaysia, where folk beliefs live alongside the mix of religions. This hodgepodge of religious influences appears in different ways throughout Zeen’s work, such as the characters covered in Mandarin text, which he says is based on Buddhist scripture.

“There is a temple just opposite from where I grew up, and it was like my playground,” he recalls. “My grandparents used to take me to see puppet shows a lot, too. Every region of China has its own shows and plays with different dialects, but my grandparents were from Hainan, so we watched Hainan operas.”

目前居住在吉隆坡的 Zeen 说，马来西亚的多元文化给了他源源不断的灵感。尽管作品中出现的大多数都是中国文化的元素，但那也是他童年在马来西亚所看到的中国文化。在这个国家，各种各样的民间信仰与宗教信仰并存，从 Zeen 的作品中可以看到这些不同的影响，例如角色身上布满的汉字其实是佛教经文。

他回忆说：“我小时候住的地方对面有一座寺庙，那里是我的游乐园。我的祖父母经常带我去那儿看木偶戏。中国每个地区都有自己独特的戏剧，操着不同的方言来表演。我祖父母来自海南，所以我们看的是海南的戏剧。”

The resemblance of Zeen’s digital paintings to video-game concept art isn’t by coincidence—he works full-time as an artist in the gaming industry and this series is just a passion project. Still, he’s reluctant to reveal too much about the book prior to its official release, aside from hinting at larger concepts around how avarice and poverty can dictate people’s lives. “Ultimately, I just want to encourage people to do what they really want before they die,” he says.

Zeen 的数字画作与视频游戏的概念艺术十分相似，这也并非偶然。他的全职工作是一名游戏行业的设计师。虽然这本画册项目只是业余爱好，在正式出版之前， 他不愿透露太多这一系列的作品，但他分享了一些创作的想法，指出对金钱的贪念与贫穷主宰着人们的生活，他说：“我只是想鼓励人们趁活着多做自己想做的事情。”

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Instagram: @zeenchin

 

Contributor: Mike Steyels
Chinese Translation: Olivia Li

喜欢我们的故事？欢迎关注我们 Neocha 的微博与微信。

 

Instagram: @zeenchin

 

供稿人: Mike Steyels
英译中: Olivia Li

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