性别喻意的空间
——何唯娜的水墨绘画
Space with Sex Message
——Weina He’s Water & Ink Painting
Xu Hong
徐 虹
观看何唯娜的水墨画要有点儿耐心，要边看边思量，画中的形象会慢慢凸现。画面会展开一些故事，我们会感受到讲故事人的心绪，那种心绪随着画中物相，浸染我们的心灵，直到进入浓密化不开的境界。
It needs patience to view and admire Weina He’s ink and wash paintings. The images in the paintings will come out in audiences’ mind while they are watching them and thinking of them at the same time. Stories will be told from the picture and we will feel the storyteller’s emotion. Little by little, the emotion would catch our soul and we could not run out of it.
她的画面很少采用通常那种让视线聚焦于画面一点的模式，不以夸张的形式和符号象征突入观者视帘；作品尺幅也与平常画幅相仿，不以巨大的幅面制造强迫效果……但正是在这些不大的画幅间，她画出一些微小而精致得需要屏气搜寻的人和物，这些人和物都笼罩在神秘雾蔼之中……幽深，诡异，令人惊讶。
Her pictures, few of which catches audiences’ eye by the exaggerative forms or symbols, seldom belongs to the mode that focus audiences’ attention on one point. The size is similar with normal one that does not make a forced effect by a huge size… Just in these normal-sized pictures, she drew some small and exquisite people and things which we must hold our breath to look for. The people and things are covered in the mysterious mist, grotesque and astonishing.
何唯娜水墨画中形象和气氛的特殊，源于她在绘画上的个性化追求，她的创作目标与大部分水墨画家的取向不同：虽然她也讲究笔墨形式的效果，但并不满足于“笔墨”形式的传统尺度；虽然她的画总是包含着一定的文化观念，但她不停留于将文化的特质简单化为纯粹的意识形态。她也不会为了迎合市场的口味而改变自己所想表达的内容，因为她从来不会为了得到别人的赞赏而改变自己。尽管画家的立场和态度，表明了一种基于个人经验的表达的方式，它和传统意义的绘画表达有很大差异。但是这种差异，仍然处于绘画史大框架之内。她选定的水墨媒材以及平面描述方式，使我们可以在“绘画”的世界谈论何唯娜的艺术。
The special image and atmosphere in He’s painting originated from her individualized pursue, whose creative purpose is different from most of the ink and wash painters. She is also particular about the effect of the form of ink and wash painting, but she does not just follow the traditional way of ink and wash painting. There are always a certain cultural concepts in her paintings, but she does not simply turn the cultural quality to pure ideal states. And she would not change what she wants to express according to the market taste, for she would never change herself to get others’ praise. Painter’s attitude indicates the expressing way based in the personal experience, which has great difference with the traditional painting expression that is still limited by the history of painting. The materials and surface expressing way that she chose makes us can talk about He’s art in the “painting” world.
对于中国的女性画家，这种在框架内行事的方式有其历史因素。我们的文化习惯和标准，实际上是要求女性按男性规定的标准从事艺术创作，美术史对女性艺术家大都以不符合“艺术标准”为借口而有意忽略记载；女性艺术家不按原有的标准行事，即有被逐出“游戏”的危险。但是女性如果一味遵从男性趣味标准的“游戏”规则从事艺术创作，无疑是“自投罗网”。因为这不仅无法释放女性的创作激情和艺术活力，而且实际上也是对女性受歧视的文化合法化表示。相对于20世纪初期的女性为争取婚姻、就学、经济独立权利而从家门出走而言，在当代社会和文化环境中，具有性别身份意识的女性艺术家，已经很难回到象征“精神束缚”的“家”——女性为了争取权利而从“家”出走，但是“出走”以后怎么办？20世纪前期和中期的中国女性，都曾努力思考和回答这个问题。相对来讲，真正在精神上有独立意识和要求，还是始于上世纪90年代。在当代环境中，女性才有充分条件从文化和历史渊源的高度，质疑男性中心文化的合法性。政治和社会以及文化环境，都提供了女性在精神上能够独立的条件。因为说到底，女性真正能获得自由和解放的持久之动力，来源于精神的自由。而旧思维习惯的改变，不是一朝一夕的事。所以中国女性的独立精神是从贫瘠的土壤中冒出的新芽，其生成过程注定漫长而又艰难，因此她们在中国社会现实中前行的压力和困惑也是明显的。这些矛盾和张力在当代中国女性艺术家作品中有所体现，它显示的和西方女权运动的时间性和阶段性差异，它的东方特有的文化和历史背景，它带给中国女性自身解放的问题，以及反映在艺术中的有关女性问题的模糊和矛盾，都给研究者留下深刻印象的同时也带来尖锐的挑战。
For Chinese female painters, the way to paint in the limited frame has the reason on history. Our cultural habit and standard actually asks the female creates art works following the male’s standard. The history of art would intentionally ignore to write down the female artists whom “not fit for the artistic standard.” If the female artists do not follow the original rule, they would be put out of the “game.” And if they just follow male artists’ taste to create art works, they would undoubtedly “hurl themselves willingly into the net” that would not only set free female artists’ creative passion and artistic energy but actually the legalized cultural expression for the discrimination against female artists. Compared with the women in the early of 1900s who run away from home for their independent rights on marriage, school and economics, female artists are hard to go back to the “home” that means the spiritual bondage. Women have run away from the “home” for their rights and next how is it going after the running away? The female in the early and middle of 1900s were serious to think about and answer this question. Contrarily it began in the 1990s that having independent consciousness and demand spiritually. In the current society, the female has sufficient condition to raise doubts about the legality of androcentric culture from the aspects of culture and history. Political, social and cultural environments have offered enough conditions for females’ independence on spirits. As we all know that females’ lasting power to get the freedom and liberation is originated from spiritual freedom and the change of the former habits to new one is not in one day, the growing course is destined to be long distance and hard way for Chinese women’s independent spirits just grow. All these contradictions and tension have been reflected in contemporary Chinese women artists’ works. It impressed the researchers so much as well as a sharp challenge that the timely difference showed with western movements for women’s rights, the special oriental cultural and historical background, the problems about Chinese women’s self-liberation and the contradiction about women reflected in the art in Chinese women artists’ works.
看何唯娜的作品，就有这种复杂的感受。在看她“娓娓道来”的“习常”叙事中，感到如此传统的女性叙事缺少一种张力和对抗，正在疑惑时，却发现她的角度和观念又在颠覆着“习常”性别的观念和视角；在她的“自我”铺展叙述中，用不卑不亢的方式，清醒、犀利地剖析了深层次的性别问题，展示了一种新颖的性别叙事前景和可能性。由此可以上升为文化和社会学意义上的两性问题思考和言说。
I have a complex feeling while seeing He’s works. When you see she breaks down the “normal” stories, you will feel that the traditional female- telling story is lack of a kind of tension and confrontation. Just on your doubting, you would find that her angle and mind are overturning the “normal” sexual mind and angle. In her “self” telling, she examines the deep sexual questions clearly and bitingly in her neither haughty nor humble way, which shows a new sex narrative foreground and possibility. From now on, it will be raised to a theory and thoughts about relationship in the meaning of culture and sociology.
何唯娜作品采用一种“讲述”的方式，这种手法与传统女性叙事相似，比如对女性私密生活的描绘，用私人空间的一些物品暗喻个人的身体性质，衣物，床，镜子，小玩意儿，盆栽花卉，盆栽水果，浴缸……尤其是伴随这些物品的人的活动，如女性的沐浴、梳妆，照镜，读书、吃冰激凌等。
He weina adopts the “narrative” way in her works similar like traditional women’s narrations, such as describing females’ private life, using some things in the private room as clothes, bed, mirror, some trinkets, flowers, fruits, bathtub, women’s showering, reading, looking into the mirror, having ice cream and so on to metaphor personal body.
Artists endow those “trinkets” in the painting some particular meaning which seems to have some mysterious charm. The combinations of these objects do not follow the normal way but with superrealism allegory. For example, in “Strawberry under the Purdah”, normal fruit “strawberry” is placed between “bed” and “purdah” and is exaggerated as a super large size, which makes strawberry beyond normal experience limits, like an animal instead of fruit lying in the purdah. The structure makes focus on the large “strawberry” and the special effects made by the light make the “strawberry” like a growing expansion organism, so that it has the erotic message. We could see it strongly in “Cranberry,” in which the size of the heavy strawberry in the huge basket is larger than the woman besides it. The coarse surface is full of tension and has charm. The painter annotates the female’s psychological tendency in the men and women’s relationship by recombining the normal things and emphasizes an invasive power existing not only in the social public life but also in the private space. In this space, there is no “idyllic” life as in the formal literary works, neither the “equality” as in the social ethics, but the biology after sociologicalization. It shows that any actions of human beings’ could not exist alone without reality, nor could two people’ space. In “Nightgown and Strawberry,” a bed opening the purdah covers most part. The transparent glass furitplate is like a transparent box with the huge strawberry like a sabre-rattling monster. And on the right of the bed, a pink nightgown is hung on the hanger in a small space. Its morbidezza is contrasted with strawberry’s ruggedness. The painter combines the normal things again to a formula and strange scene and makes some thinking on the formula things about some informal questions.
画中的那些“小玩意儿”，让人感到好像具有神秘的魔力，艺术家赋予它们非同一般的意义。这是因为这些物体之间的关系组合不是按照习惯的方式，而是具有超越现实的讽喻意味。比如《帷幕下的草莓》一画中，将日常水果“草莓”安置在“床”和“帷幕”之间，给予超出现实比例的夸张。“草莓”尺寸的超常巨大，使“草莓”超越了日常经验限阈，它不像水果，而像动物，匍匐于帷幕中。构图造成视线聚焦于突兀的“草莓”，光线造成的特殊效果使“草莓”像不断膨胀的生物体，具有了性别象征物的情色寓意。这种情形在《酸草莓》中显得更为突出。画中碩大的果篮中那肉质厚实的草莓，尺寸比近旁的女性人物还大，粗砺的表层充满张力，闪烁一种怪异的魔性。画家通过习以为常的事物重新组合，诠释了女性在两性关系中的心理倾向，强调一种强行和侵入的特权不仅仅在社会公共生活里存在，也弥漫在隐密的私人空间里。这个空间里，不仅没有一般文学艺术作品中所描述的那般“诗情画意”，或者社会伦理宣讲的那般“平等”，而是社会学观念在生物学中的继续“演绎”，是社会学化了的生物学。它表明，人类的任何行为与举措，不能够脱离现实作用而孤立存在，两人的空间也如此。这种意识在画中处处能感到，虽然这是通过一种更为委婉曲折的方式来表达。《睡衣和草莓》一画中主要部分被一张拉开帷幕的床占据，透明的玻璃水果盘就像一个透明的盒子，巨大的“草莓”像“张牙舞爪”异物，盘踞期间，棱角分明，表层的“果刺”咄咄逼人。而在床的左边，一个狭小的空间里，衣架上悬挂了一件粉色女睡衣，纤弱柔美与“草莓”的张扬和粗犷形成鲜明对比。艺术家再一次用具体熟悉的日常事物组合了一种熟悉而陌生的场景，通过熟悉的事物来思考一些不寻常的问题，并在“陌生化”的关系场中去发现“习常”中之悖谬。以提示表面下的事实存在。
But the women and these small things in the paintings have same “symbolizing” meaning not only for the same “small” size but also for the internal consistency of “female symbol” and “plaything symbol.” “Their” face and their size are like to be made in a same mode. The dramatic contrary and setting is connected with the idea the painter wants to express which is related with the search about female’s quality. Some works of the painting and thinking on female’s “quality” are symbolic and also metaphor with some concrete things. “Red Hubble-bubble” series could explain her concepts. Red hubble-bubbles are obvious that they are a kind of physiological materials instead of normal daily things that cause people think of females’ physiological phenomenon, for example, some “blood & water” tension about procreation and females’ physiological cycle. The painter puts them into the bathtub and makes some “blood” hubble-bubbles on it, which are transparent like the balloon. It is very interesting that the females among them who are bride, little girl, woman soldier in green military uniform and images of herself. Obviously, He weina is focusing on the infection of the red bubble-bubbles to the females’ psychology and daily actions. In Little Girl and Red Bubbles, “red bubbles” in the vase like flowers looks like the rising and expanding balloons which cover most of the space of the picture. As a kind of indication of female psychology, it is big, plump and with biologic tension ,compared with which a little girl and a cat would be gray, pale and weak,oppressed by the huge physiological images and cannot raise the head. The meaning of Bride in Bubbles is more obvious. In a huge bathtub, brides wearing nothing above the waist of the wedding veils are in bubbles which means the “bride” is the “creature” with reproducibility. The most meaningful thing is that there is a steelyard comes down from the above and “scales” the whole “bathtub,” “red bubbles” and “brides.” It is obvious that painter expresses her dissatisfaction and suspicion that female’s idiosyncracy is connected with female’s reproducibility by a funny way.
但是画中的女性也与这些小物品具有相同的“象征”意味。不仅因为这些女性形象和具体日常事物比较显得“小小的”，甚至比所熟悉的更小的“物件”还小；也因为这些 “女性象征”与“玩具象征”有内在一致性。“她们”的表情，她们的尺寸，好像都从一种模式中产生。这种戏剧性的对比和设定，是与画家想表达的观念有关，根本的与有关女性特质的探索相联系。好几幅作品对女性“特质”的描绘与思考，也具有象征性，也用具体的事物作比喻，并采取陌生化的手法显示荒谬的存在。较能说明她观念的是“红泡泡”系列。红泡泡显然不是一般的生活物体，它是一种生理性的物质。它使人联想起女性有关的生理现象，比如和生殖，和女性生理周期有关的“血水”意向。画家将它们置放在浴缸中，让它们泛起繁殖和扩张的生物性“血泡泡”。它们像气球一般透明，大大小小地挤在一起。有意思的是间隔期间的女性人物，她们是新娘，小女孩，穿绿军衣的女兵，也有画家自己的形象……显然何唯娜在这里强调这类“红泡泡”对于女性心理和日常行为关系的影响，也就是关于女性生物特质如何在社会学层面被利用，从而对女性心理和行为产生作用。看《小女孩与红泡泡》一画，像花束般被供养在一个花瓶类容器中的“红泡泡”，就像不断升腾和扩张的气球，它在画面上占据大半空间。作为一种女性生理象征物，它高大、丰满、具有生物性的张力，而一个小女孩和一只小猫，与这象征女性特质的物体比，显得灰暗苍白弱小，像是被这巨大的生理性形象压抑得抬不起头来，消解在灰暗的背景中。《泡泡中的新娘》的喻意更为明显，在如同巨大浴缸的容器中，翻滚着“红泡泡”。泡泡中，披着婚纱的新娘们裸着上身，象征“新娘”具有的生殖性“生物”含义。最有意味的是上方垂下一杆吊秤，将整个“浴缸”，连同“红泡泡”，“ 新娘”们一起“过秤”。作者显然用一种幽默和调侃的方式，来揭示显而易见背后的真实，表达对女性特质与生物化定义相联系的怀疑和不满。
这种叙事加象征的手法将意象叠加，不同的单一意象汇聚成模糊而具有丰富含义的手法，好像让人回到了一个古老的时代，那时候，每一种事物被人赋予独立的意义和性质，并以此来认识和理解整个世界。比如太阳，作为阳性事物的象征，代表光明，向上，积极，父亲，男性，统治阶级，最高统治者等等；而大地，代表承受万物和哺育万物的象征，隐喻阴性事物，象征母亲，女性，被动性等。这当然是古代人对世界万物的一种认知方法。而在经历了现代理性和科学技术革命之后，人类追求客观性过程中，对自然和环境的认识不再与自身采取直接的对应关系。但是当代文化背景下，尤其是女性借用这种感知方式对男性文化范式揶揄和调侃，可以使女性艺术的创作活力在当代精神氛围中获得释放。
The way to get narration and indication together makes the superposition of imagery. Various single imageries form indistinct but meaningful skill which seems to bring people back to ancient times. At that time, every thing is endued with independent meaning and character so as to know and understand the whole world. For example, sun, as the symbol of male, indicates bright, positive, father, male, the ruling class, the sovereign and so on. And the land, the symbol of nurture and bear, indicates the female, mother, women and passivity. Of course this is the way that ancient people knew the world. And after the modern scientific technology reform, human beings no longer directly connected the acknowledgement of nature and circumstance with self during the pursue of objectivity. Therefore, under the background of contemporary culture, women could use this way to tease men’s cultural form that could free the creative energy of women art’s in the surrounding of contemporary spirits.
女性艺术家对这种借喻应用得心应手，这不是模仿，而是“创作性”借用。看何唯娜借用这些象征手法表达私人空间活动，并不是真如古人那样确信这个世界就如他们所理解的那样，太阳和月亮，就如男人和女人，阴和阳，或者盆栽花儿和盆栽水果能够祈福，镜子能够避邪等等。何唯娜使用人们再熟悉不过的象征，进行移换，为自己的表达组织新的象征和比喻。比如，她的“镜子”系列，在镜子布置如迷宫的格局中，女人就成为所有镜子的反射对象，有时变成一种面孔，有时只照得零碎片断的肢体；“时钟”系列中，各时段的钟和弯弯曲曲的管道，石头阶梯等联系一起，画下方一个趴着的裸体女性，就像被时间和机械管道压扁了。人们不妨认为这是女性对生命意义的表达，以及对女性所承担责任的疑惑。因为这些作品里都隐喻了一种对过去和未来认识的反思，画家从时间的维度，从镜子反射的影像，从台阶、管道的延伸，从这些角度和途径，来表达她的思考。
Women artists are familiar with the metonymy which is not imitation but the “creative” metonymy. We can see that Weina He use this metonymy to express the private activity, but different with the ancient people understood the world, such as sun and moon, women and men, yin and yang. Or potted flowers and potted fruits could prey luckiness, mirror could avoid evil. Weina He uses the familiar symbols and transforms them to form new symbol and metaphor for her. For example, in her “mirror” series, women become the reflected subjects of all the mirrors, sometimes with a face, sometimes with just some branches. In the “clock” series, the clocks at different time are connected with zigzag pipes and stone steps while a lying naked woman beneath the picture is like to be pressed by time and machine pipes. We could think that this is women’s expression about life and the doubt about the responsibility women should undertake. In these works, there is a confession about past and future. Painter expresses her thinking from the time, the image of mirror reflected, the stretching of steps and pipes and so on.
“浴缸”、“女娃娃”和“红泡泡”的意向互相承接，都与女性生活的私密性相关，但是非正常的比例关系以及不相称的环境重组，使之产生了异样的效果，并有了当代文化的讽喻性。而画中有些事物的意向是相互抵消的，如“草莓”和“床”，“管道”和“钟”等等，将熟悉的事物之间惯常的排列以及不寻常的排列并置，在看似非逻辑的组合中，却产生了合逻辑的结果。何唯娜利用民间和非正统的隐喻方式，使画面呈现为故事情节的展开，但又阻断了习惯性的“流畅”阅读——因为每一物象本身具有独立意义，每一物象在和其它物象联结中，已经成约定俗成的关系。如果习惯顺序被打断，那么按照传统来阅读画的情节也就不可能。但却因为旧的组合断裂，重新寻找组合方式，这样，新的艺术生长点也雏形略备。
The meanings of “Bathtub,” “girl doll” and “red bubbles” are taken over for each other that are related with privacy of female life. But the improper size and the inappropriate recombination form different effects with allegory of contemporary culture. And the meaning of something’s in the picture is canceled out, like “strawberry” and “bed,” “pipe” and “clock.” Weina He uses the untraditional metonymy to spread the story on the picture and stops the “fluent” reading, for everything has its independent meaning and has formed the conventional relationship when connected with other things. If the conventional sequence has been stopped, it will be impossible to read the picture as traditional way. But for the broken of the old combination, new art point is growing.
【编辑：霍春常】
