宗宁Zong Ning

陈晨

中国艺术家宗宁创作了《线索》，反映了他在疫情期间的情感变化。这幅作品是多种材料创作而成，包括丙烯颜料和木板。由艺术家绘制而成的绿色网格上，定义了画面中最最引人注目的元素：那一点红，像鲜血一样。红色的液体好似在布满网格的木板上蔓延，沿着表面丝丝延伸，彷佛要将整个框架填满。鲜红色与黄棕色的反差，给人强烈的视觉冲击。

宗宁将他画面中的色彩表达简化为一滴滴落在木板上的红色颜料，让它流动、蔓延、渗透到艺术品的表面。这位中国艺术家的创作手法与著名抽象表现主义绘画大师波洛克的作品有共同之处。波洛克以他的“滴画”技法，创造了举世闻名的行动绘画风格。虽然宗宁的《线索》并没有完全反映波洛克艺术创作，但是二者有着有趣的相似之处：他们都表现出对抽象的偏爱。其作品都缺乏具象性，这是一种能够充分表达情感的方式，也能激发观者的想象。因此，《线索》也可以称为一幅抽象绘画，其特征也与宗宁的摄影作品中的一些元素类似。

“即使我们再狂妄自大，我们也无法凌驾于自然之上，更无法阻止灾难的发生，这不正是大自然给我们的警示吗？”

谈及疫情，宗宁强调了“发生既有痕迹，欲望伴随代价”。画面中的红色就象征着一切灾难和悲剧的源头，这个源头逐渐的扩张蔓延：无人能阻。当灾难降临的时候，宗宁想告诉我们，这是自然对人类的报复：没有人能够置身事外。我们可以看到：随着现代文明的发展，科技的进步，人类的野心也越来越大。而事实证明，即使我们再狂妄自大，我们也无法凌驾于自然之上，更无法阻止灾难的发生，这不正是大自然给我们的警示吗？疫情爆发时，我们该如何度过？而疫情过后，我们又该何去何从？或许，我们应该试着和自然和谐共处。

新冠肺炎的发生让每个人都陷入悲痛，每个人都有着不同的经历，所以每个人对此都有不一样的表达。寻找意义的过程并不简单，宗宁的艺术创作宣示了自然之于人类的报复。也许这来自艺术家本人生活经历。宗宁出生于内蒙古，为适应当代中国现代而繁忙的都市生活而奋斗。人类对于自然的敬畏之意也一少再少，我们总认为自己和上帝一样无所不能，但事实上，我们只是宇宙中微不足道的一点而已。

By Chen Chen

Chinese artist Zong Ning has created Clue as a part of his project reflecting on his emotional upheaval during the pandemic. The work is mixed media, including acrylic paint and wood panels. An acid green grid, painted by the artist himself, defines the space wherein which the most striking visual element presents itself: A spot of red paint, resembling blood. The red liquid appears as spread out all over the wooden grid, stretching along its surface, in the attempt to fill the whole frame. The bright red is in stark contrast with the yellowish brown, thus creating a strong visual impact.

Zong Ning reduces its expressive palette to a drop of red paint on a board, allowing it to flow over, spread into, and permeate the artistic surface. There is something in the gestural component of the Chinese artist that echoes the work of Jackson Pollock, the famous abstract expressionist. With his dripping technique, Pollock developed a unique style of action painting. Though Zong Ning’s Clue does not exactly mirror Pollock’s creations, there is an interesting similarity between those two: They both have a certain preference for abstraction. The lack of representational content both in Pollock and Zong Ning is a device for effectively expressing emotions in ways that can stimulate the viewer’s imagination. Therefore, Clue could be called an abstract painting, whose features resemble some elements of his photography.

“In spite of our hubris, we can’t control nature and prevent disasters. Isn’t that what nature is warning us about?”

In talking about the pandemic, Zong Ning emphasizes that “Our actions have consequences, and desires come with a price.” In the painting, the red color comes to symbolize the source of all tragedies and disasters. This point of origin is gradually expanding and spreading: It can’t be stopped. When disasters strike, Zong Ning wants to tell us, it is nature’s revenge against humanity: No one can stay out of it. And here we can see a pattern. With the development of modern civilization and the progress of science and technology, the ambition of human beings is just getting bigger and bigger. But it is obvious that, in spite of our hubris, we can’t control nature and prevent disasters. Isn’t that what nature is warning us about? How do we get through an outbreak when we think about it, and how do we get through it after? Perhaps, we should try to live in harmony with nature.

The outbreak of the Covid-19 has brought to all of us grief. Just life every person experiences it in a different way, so each one of us should express it differently. The process of finding meaning is not simple. Zong Ning’s creation suggests that this is the revenge of nature. Perhaps this is something that comes from the artist’s personal story. Born in Inner Mongolia, he struggled in adapting to a life in the big metropolises of contemporary China, so crowded and modern. We humans have little or no respect for nature. We believe ourselves to be as powerful as god, when in fact we are just a small point in the universe.