When she first began painting, Shang Liang created carefully arranged, realistic depictions of everyday scenes in a mild color palette. Fifteen years later, her works have different air: one of abnormal power and force. She paints muscular characters that seem to burst out of the frame of her large canvases. They can be human or inhuman, but they all possess the same larger-than-life muscles.
Born in 1981 in Beijing, Shang was raised in a military community in the same city. She attended the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA), where she studied oil painting under Liu Xiaodong, one of China’s greatest painters. Several years later, searching for new means of expression, she returned to CAFA for a master’s degree in experimental art, and there she developed a distinctive, slightly surreal style.
刚开始画画时，商亮喜欢用柔淡的色调，描绘各种精心设计、写实风格的日常场景。15 年后，她的作品呈现出截然不同的风格：充满怪异力量感的画面。她笔下肌肉发达的角色像是要从画中冲出来一样。这些角色既有人类也有非人类，但无一例外，都拥有夸张的发达肌肉。
商亮 1981 年出生于北京，从小在当地一个军区大院长大。后来入读了中央美术学院，师从中国著名画家刘小东学习油画。几年后，为了寻找新的表达方式，她又回到中央美术学院，修读实验艺术硕士学位，并在那里形成自己独特的、偏超现实主义的绘画风格。
This distinctive style began to appear when she became interested in the subject of adolescence: “I think there is obscurity about this period in life,” she explains, “teenagers have confused emotions and uncertainty about what they will become. It’s a period of intense transformation and development, both in the body and the mind.” More than anything else, adolescence is an important moment for developing a moral sense. Teenagers are complicated beings, innocent and still quite vulnerable to the influences around them.
这种独特的风格起源于她对青春期这个主题的兴趣：“我认为人在这个时期是模糊的。”她解释说，“对于自己将会变成什么样，青少年会觉得困惑和不确定。无论是身体还是心灵，这都是一个经历激烈变化和发展的时期。”更重要的是，青春期是形成个人道德观念的重要阶段。处于这个时期的少男少女是非常复杂的，他们既单纯烂漫，对周遭影响又相当敏感。
In 2012, Shang began to work on The Real Boy series, portraying slender teenage boys with hypertrophic abdominals, chests, and arms. Some are flexing their muscles so hard that veins pop out on their skin. Their faces still reveal tenderness and immaturity, but their expressions and body language suggest a longing to become powerful, muscle-bound men.
Some paintings in this series feature boys with long, pointy noses, a clear reference to Carlo Collodi’s classic children’s tale Pinocchio. Like the puppet who dreamed of becoming a real boy, the characters in these paintings have to prove themselves mature without straying from the path of honesty and morality. This series dramatizes the challenges and conflicting impulses of adolescence.
2012 年，商亮开始创作《正道仔》系列，描绘一些有着大腹肌、粗壮胸部和手臂的十几岁少年。其中一些男孩用力展示自己的肌肉，以致于手臂上青筋爆突。他们的面孔仍然显露出温柔和稚嫩，但他们的表情和肢体语言却流露出成为肌肉结实的男人的渴望。
在此系列的一些画作中，有些男孩有着又长又尖的鼻子，这显然是在借鉴 Carlo Collodi 的经典儿童故事《木偶奇遇记》中的匹诺曹。就像梦想成为真正男孩的木偶人一样，这些画中的男孩必须在遵守诚实和道德的原则上，证明自己是成熟的男人。这个系列戏剧化地展示了青春期的各种挑战和矛盾的冲动。
Shang’s following series, Good Hunter, developed naturally from The Real Boy: it’s as if the same characters had grown both in physical form and in confidence. The new characters seem to have exaggerated internal strength, with bodies developed into cartoonish muscular form. Their faces, however, retain the same boyish expressions or have no expression at all. The oversized canvases, bigger than a human body, suggest an intimidating superhuman strength. Standing before these characters, the viewer may feel small, or even oppressed. The exaggerated manliness combined with a complete absence of women seems to be an allusion to patriarchal systems built on oppression and misogyny.
接下来的延伸系列，商亮创作了《好猎手》：画里的人们仿佛还是同一个身份角色，但在身体上发育了，也变得更自信。这些新的少年形象似乎在夸大自己内在的力量，身体有着卡通般的夸张肌肉。然而，他们的面孔却保留着同样的孩子气，或索性面无表情。超大尺寸的画布，比真人更大，代表一种超乎常人的力量。站在这些男孩形象面前，观众可能感觉自己很渺小，甚至充满压迫感。这种夸张的男子气概、女性形象的完全缺席，似乎是对建立在压迫和厌女的基础上、父权制的暗示。
In Boxing Man, her latest series, Shang departs completely from realistic human anatomy, and a new character emerges: one with a boxing glove in the place of the head and no sexual organs. None of her characters ever really have an adult face, and here they are frightening and inhuman creatures. As she explains: “It’s not human. It’s a new species. You can guess how it senses the world, what it feels, and what it thinks.” With the metaphor of strength and power becoming a head on their own, Boxing Man appears as the culmination of all underlying issues found in her previous series: the struggle for the ultimate strength, the torture of moral dilemmas, and the blind pursuit of power.
在她最新系列作品《拳击人》中，商亮完全脱离真实人体的描绘，创作出全新的角色：一个以拳套代替头部且没有性器官的角色。在她笔下，没有一个角色是成年人的面孔，相反，它们都是一些可怕和非人形的生物。对此，她解释道：“这不是人类，而是一种新物种。你可以去想象它是如何感知这个世界的，以及它的感受和它的思考方式。”在《拳击人》中，这些角色的头部被用来象征力量和权力，因此，整个系列似乎是对她之前所有作品的潜在主题的总结：奋斗以求的终极力量、囿于道德困境的折磨，和对权力的盲目追求。
As references for her characters, Shang looks to bodybuilding and fighting TV shows. She also refers to classical sculptures by Michelangelo. To achieve a certain luminosity, she places different layers of paint one over the other. Red, dark-red, and brown are predominant colors, evoking oxygenated and deoxygenated blood and bruises. Her brushstrokes have a notable strength, which comes, no doubt, from her practice of Chinese calligraphy. There are also elements of taiji embedded in the movements and curves of the characters.
Although she has unconsciously absorbed traditional Chinese elements, Shang’s underlying subject matter is not specific to any country or culture. Her work can be seen as a critical commentary on traditional ideas of masculinity. It is fascinating that this appraisal comes from a female artist. If boys face excruciating difficulties when expected to assume the role of a man, what do girls feel when they, too, are expected to succeed?
Selected works from Good Hunter and Boxing Man are on display in a solo show at MadeIn Gallery until the first of September.
Address:
MadeIn Gallery
Longteng Avenue, lane 2879, no. 106
Xuhui district, Shanghai
www.madeingallery.com
为了角色的创作，商亮观看了各种健美和格斗类电视节目，并参考了米开朗基罗的古典雕塑作品。为了打造光亮感，她将不同的颜料层层叠涂。以红色、深红色和棕色为主的色调，令人联想到各种氧合血、脱氧血和瘀伤。得益于曾习过中国书法，商亮的笔触十分有力。角色的动作和曲线，也融合了太极拳的元素。
虽然她在创作中无意识地糅合了中国传统元素，但商亮的作品主题并无针对任何一个国家或文化。她的作品可以看作是对男性气质的传统观念的批判。让人深思的是，这种评价来自一位女艺术家。如果男孩被要求扮演男人的角色时，就会面临极度的困难，那么当女孩们被指望着人生有成的时候，她们又会作何感想呢？
来自《好猎手》和《拳击人》系列的精选作品日前正在上海没顶画廊举办的个展中展出，展览将于 9 月 1 日闭幕。
地址:
没顶画廊
上海市徐汇区
龙腾大道2879号106室
www.madeingallery.com
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Website: shangliang.co
Contributor: Tomás Pinheiro
Chinese Translation: Olivia Li
