Angel

Martina Koeppel-Yang

Sun Yuan & Peng Yu's works always start with a paradox. Their early objects and installations are made from real cadavers or human fat tissues. Yet, even though playing on the speculative and the spectacular, they focus on the investigation of the paradox rather than merely exploiting the spectacular. The tension between the bodies, organic tissues or animals and their artistic manifestations corresponds to the transposition of subjects from the plane of immanence onto the plane of transcendence. In their recent installations using hyper-realistic sculpture, they reverse their original practice: imagination and mythological subjects penetrate into the realm of everyday life and reality. Angel, a life-size sculpture in fiber-reinforced polymer and silica gel of a fallen angel is typical of this new approach. The angel, an old woman in a white gown and with featherless wings, is lying face-down on the ground; maybe sleeping, maybe dead, but certainly immobile and frozen into an all too realistic image. The supernatural being, now nothing more than an impotent creature, can neither carry out any supreme will nor be of any help to those believing in its existence. The angel is true but ineffective; dreams and hopes are sincere yet vain.

 

 

天使

杨天娜

孙原和彭禹的作品总是从矛盾开始。他们早期的研究对象与装置作品都是 由真实的尸体或人体脂肪组织做成。他们的作品不仅在视觉呈现上比较 有张力,他们更为关注的却是隐藏在作品中的矛盾关系而非视觉效果上的 攀比。人体、有机组织或动物之间的张力以及其艺术性的呈现反映了对主题 的置换,是由内在向外在的超越。他们最近的装置作品往往运用的是超现实 的仿真雕塑的手法,从而把原来的方法论完全颠倒过来:将想象和神话的 主题渗透到日常生活和现实的领域中来。天使,一个真人尺寸、用强化纤维 聚合物和硅胶制作的雕塑,这个“坠落天使”便是这种新手法的典型例子。 一个长着残秃翅膀、身着白袍的老妪,趴在地上,也许是在睡觉,也许是 死了,但肯定是无法动弹了,仿佛是现实的形象冻结而成。这个超越自然的 生灵,现在不过是个无能的生物体,既不能执行(上帝)至高无上的意志, 也无法对围绕在其周围的信徒们有任何帮助可言。她确确实实是个“天使”, 但却无能为力,真诚的梦想与希望不过是徒劳而已。