踩不死的蚂蚁——谈陈志光的不锈钢蚂蚁雕塑 作者：杨卫

　在我小时候，有大孩子们向我提过一个问答题，问我动物界什么动物的力量最大，我的回答当然是大象、老虎、犀牛之类，没想到大孩子们只摇头，最后告诉我的结果却是小小的蚂蚁。他们说大象之类的动物尽管能够搬动大的物件，可一旦超过自己的体量，它们便只能望尘莫及了，而蚂蚁的体量虽然很渺小，却能够扛起超过自己体重几倍甚至几十倍的物品。经人这么解释，我这才恍然大悟，原来这个不起眼的蚂蚁才是动物界真正的大力士。从此以后，那些蚂蚁的形象便在我心底高大了起来，以至于在我成长的历程中，每每再听到一些飞扬跋扈的家伙拿蚂蚁来打比方，说出“踩死一个人就像踩死一只蚂蚁”之类的语言时，我都会嗤之以鼻，觉得这些人才是真正渺小的家伙，不值一提。



　　当陈志光拿来他新近做的这批蚂蚁雕塑给我看时，我脑子里最初闪现的就是我小时候那道没有回答上的问答题。我不清楚是什么原因驱使陈志光关注这样一个蚂蚁的题材，但透过他作品对蚂蚁的放大，尤其是采用不锈钢材料来造型，赋予其现代文明的硬度与光感，使我似乎明白了陈志光的用意。也许陈志光也跟我一样碰到过有关蚂蚁的问答题，也许他的人生也曾遭遇过人不如人的经历，也许……但不管怎样，陈志光是从艺术观念的角度第一个在蚂蚁身上发现意义的人。如果说一颗沙子可以看出一个世界，那么绝不是因为沙子中包含了世界，而是发现的眼睛赋予了沙子一个全新的感观世界。发现者即是创造者。所以，当陈志光发现了蚂蚁并将其转换成自己的艺术语言时，重要的就已经不再是蚂蚁了，而是通过蚂蚁的隐喻所引伸出来的那个有关人世间诸多不平与不公的思想话题。



　　人，生来是平等的，但社会产生的私有制却摧毁了这种平等。正因为如此，欧洲的启蒙运动才有了像卢梭那样的反思一端。卢梭曾写过一篇著名的论文《论人类不平等的起源与基础》，以自然人的概念来质疑社会进化产生的不平等关系，从而开启了近代的人性思维，尤其是他提出的“天赋人权”口号，不仅成为了欧洲启蒙思想的内核，而且也深刻地影响了东亚的现代化之路。十九世纪以来的中国，在救国自强的思想下产生了一批启蒙思想家，如严复、梁启超、章太炎、鲁迅等等。这些人或多或少均在卢梭思想那里吸收过营养，尤其是鲁迅，将卢梭的思想作为解剖的利器，针对中国的现实状态，指出“中国的历史只是帝王将相的家谱史”，由此提倡关注下层，关注民间社会，更是一改过去贵族文人一统天下的局面，开创了一种新的世风。



　　陈志光的艺术直接受益于这种新的人文气象。如果说80年代中国所出现的现代艺术运动，是重新站在当年鲁迅们的立场上解放思想，那么作为80年代的大学生，尤其对于思想活跃的陈志光，无疑会耳濡目染地感受到一些人性解放的信息。事实上，正是这样一些解放的信息驱使陈志光后来走上了自由的艺术创作之路。从他的艺术实践中，我能看出他受思想解放的影响。正如他的艺术涉及绘画、雕塑、公共艺术等诸多门类，而风格也是呈现出多种变化一样。这种不受拘泥的开放思维，应该说正是80年代文化启蒙的结果。不过，我所关心的不是陈志光那种齐头并进的艺术多样性，而是他在多样的艺术实践中所始终贯穿的对人及其人的生存环境的关照。



　　其实，只要我们细心观看陈志光的作品，便会发现他作品中这样一个主要的线索。比如他的雕塑，将大量现实材料进行转换，总给人一种化腐朽为神奇的生命启迪;而他的绘画，以表现主义的风格来刻画一些类似生命细胞的图景，也总是带给人一种命运畅游的联想。当然，最典型的作品还是他新近做的这批不锈钢蚂蚁雕塑。应该说，这批作品出来成为了陈志光的艺术走向成熟的一个标志。原因就在于他对人及其人的生存环境的那种关照，已经从过去的精神抽象走向了文化的具体。尽管蚂蚁在陈志光的手中仍然是作为一个精神载体而复活的，但蚂蚁真实而具体的形象，尤其是它在人的世界里所已有的拟人化象征，却使陈志光的这批作品具有了强烈的文化针对性。



　　我说过，重要的不是蚂蚁，而是陈志光通过蚂蚁的隐喻所引伸出来的对人性的那种认识。在一个长期把人民视为蚂蚁的权力社会下，陈志光能够把目光投到蚂蚁身上，本身就包含了一种意识的启蒙。也就是说，在思想逻辑上，他继承了卢梭、鲁迅等先人，都是要解放底层，质问人类的种种不平等。蚂蚁虽小，五脏六腹俱全。这句流传的老话曾经告诫过我们的国人，对于弱小生命同样要尊重。可是，说是这么说，千百年来却始终放不到那些强权们的心上。结果是该欺负的还在欺负，该踩的仍还是一如继往地踩。只有到了今天，当陈志光将蚂蚁塑造成不锈钢的材料，并放大千百倍，赋予其踩不死的内涵后，语言才真正变成了力量，变成了纪念碑式的现代文明象征。



　　杨卫

　　2006.7.6于通州

　The ants that couldn’t be trampled

　　----On Chenzhiguang’s stainless steel sculpture of ants

　　By Yang Wei

　　When I was a kid, some of my older peers had ever asked me a question that which animal had got the greatest strength. My answer, of course, was about some animals like elephant, tiger, rhinoceros etc. but I was surprised to see their shaking heads. It was the tiny ants, they said, that was the answer. Though big animals such as elephants can carry the large things, they can not move the things which are heavier than their own weight. An ant has a tiny body but it can lift up the things which is several times or tens of times heavier than its own weight. After I heard the explanation, I suddenly realized that the tiny ant is the real Hercules in animal kingdom. The images of the ants have become so lofty from then on that I sniffed to some arrogant and domineering people who said “ Killing a man by trampling him is like trampling an ant.” Those who dare to say that are really humble, I think.

　　So when Chenzhiguang showed me his newly-created ant sculptures, the former unanswered question flashed upon my mind initially. I don’t know what drove Chenzhiguang to care such a theme of ants, but later I seem to understand his intention of amplifying the ants by shaping stainless steel, which is endowed with the rigidity and brightness of modern civilization.

　　Maybe Chenzhiguang came across the same question about the ants like me, maybe he also experienced the life of being ignored, maybe…but anyway, Chen became the first man who endowed the ants with significance from an artistic angle. If we say that a sand can reflect a world, it doesn’t mean that the sand contains a world but it is the discoverable eyes that entrusted the sand to a bran-new world. The finder is the creator. So, when Chen found the ants and changed them into his own artistic language, the importance is not focused on the ants but the ideological theme of inequality and unfairness elicited by the metaphor of the ants.

　　All men are created equal, but such equality was destroyed by social private ownership. And because of this, European enlightening movement formed the side of introspection represented by Rousseau. One of Rousseau’s works was famous—On the origin and the base of human being inequality, in this book, he wrote, inequality caused by social evolution should be queried by the concept of natural person, which enlightened the neoteric humanness thinking. The slogan of “ Man’s natural rights” put forward by Rousseau not only became the core of European enlightening movement but greatly influenced the modernization process of eastern Asia. Since 19th century, China has produced a group of enlightening thinkers like Yanfu, Liangqichao, Zhangtaiyan, Luxun and so on, who more or less absorbed the ideaistic nutrition from Rousseau. And Luxun regarded Rousseau’s ideology as a scalpel to dissect Chinese society in his time, pointing out that “ Chinese history is just the monarch and noble’s family history.” Luxun later advocated caring the lower class and the civilians, which changed noble literators’ dominion position and initiated a new moral values of society.

　　Chenzhiguang’s art benefits directly from such a new humanism atmosphere. If we considered the modern art movement appearing in 1980s as an ideological liberation which inherited from Luxuns, Chenzhiguang, being a 1980s university student with active mind, would be undoubtedly influenced by some information of humanity liberation which he constantly sees and hears. In fact, it is the emancipatory information that drove Chenzhiguang to be engaged in free art creativity. I can sense that he was influenced by ideological liberation from his artistic practice and the 1980s cultural enlightening movement resulted in his unconstrained artistic style and opening mind. His art covers the fields of painting, sculpture, public art and so forth and demonstrates its diversity. But what I concern most is not Chen’s artistic diversity but his attention to the human and living environment which implicated in his various artistic practice.

　　As a matter of fact, if we watch Chenzhiguang’s works attentively, we will find out his works are linked with a dominating clue. His sculpture, based on the transform of real materials, gives audience life enlightening of changing wastes into valuables; his painting, describing images which are similar to living cells in an expressionistic style, gives people an association of enjoying a tour in one’s destiny. But, of course, the most representative works are his newly created ants sculpture made of stainless steel. It should also be emphasized that these works symbolized the maturation of his art. His attention to human and living environment has been turned from a spiritual state to cultural concretion. Ants relive as a spirit carrier in Chen’s hand, but their real concrete images and personate symbolization in human world make this group of works possess strong cultural pertinence.

　　As I have mentioned, ants are not important, what comes first is Chenzhiguang’s realization to humanity which was elicited by the metaphor of ants, Chenzhiguang’s eyes could be bent on ants in a power society that regards people as ants, which contained a consciousness enlightening. That is to say, in ideology logic, he inherited some forerunners’ ideas like Roussean, Luxun etc. to liberate the lower class and query various human inequality. As the old Chinese saying goes: “ Small as it is, the ant has all the vital organs.”, even the weak and small lives should be respected. But the might always neglect this, they bully who think they could be bullied and trample what they think could be trampled. Only when Chenzhiguang molded the stainless steel ants and amplified it hundreds of times could the ants contain untrampled connotation and then change language into strength, which has become monumental modern civilization symbol.