“艺术是践行自由的场所”——汪建伟访谈

艾 姝 采访整理 岳中生 译

“艺术是践行自由的场所”
——汪建伟访谈

艾 姝 采访整理 岳中生 译

编者按：作为艺术家，汪建伟名声在外。但当完成这次采访，我们更愿意用“活跃的思考者”来描述他。他以个人的自由意志，重构着我们“习以为常”的世界，并一次次地挑战自我。这篇访谈或许可以展现他思想世界的一角。

Editor’s Note: As an artist, Wang Jianwei is widely acclaimed. However, we would prefer to describe him as an“agile thinker” after our interview with him. With an individual free will, he has repeatedly challenged himself and sought to reconstruct the world which we “have been accustomed to.” This interview may throw some light on his rich, spiritual world.

2016年5月13日，汪建伟老师在工作室里接受了采访。采访前，他并没有要求先看采访提纲。采访时，他根据我的提问作思考和应答。他对我的提问本身具有审慎的态度，往往会指出问题本身的漏洞，然后以自己的知识体系和话语来重整问题，进行回答，思维敏捷，思想深邃。这些超出采访提问预设的回答，或可为我们提供与以往不同的观察角度。更重要的是，尽管被称为艺术家，汪建伟看向的不只是艺术，而是更具普遍性的世界。

On May 13, 2016, Mr. Wang Jianwei received our interview in his studio. Before that, he had not asked to take a look at our outline for questions. He was such a discreet thinker that he would even point out vulnerabilities in my questions, and then reorganize them within his own knowledge system and discourse before answering them. His quickwitted and thoughtful answers went beyond what we had expected, which may offer us a fresh angle of observation. More importantly, Wang, though known as an artist, concerns himself not only with art, but also with a far more universal world.

艾姝（以下简称“艾”）：您最近去卡塔尔参加展览，展出的作品和之前有什么大的变化吗？

Ai Shu (hereinafter referred to as “Ai”): Recently, you joined a Qatar art exhibition. Any major change in your works as compared with before?

汪建伟（以下简称“汪”）：其实你这个问题，让我想到，有的时候一个问题的背后还涵盖了什么样的问题。就是说，艺术家的工作要变化，但变化成为心理需求的话，它会演变成为对景观的要求，而不能反映艺术家的态度。所以，我认为，“变化”实际上是对艺术家已有创造的不断怀疑，从而产生对眼前事物的不信任，这比不停地追求作品外观的景观性的变化，更有意义。这就涉及到艺术家的工作方式。举个例子，我做《时间寺》系列作品，持续了长达一年，在古根海姆博物馆展出，然后在长征空间做了个展“脏物”，后来做卡塔尔的展览，其实我在工作室的工作没有变化。怎么理解呢？我最近几年一直在思考，艺术家的工作到底是一种什么样的工作，我在尝试一种不是为展览而工作的方式，展览的时间、空间又如何正好与我在工作室的工作产生某种关系。我说的这三个展览是有延续性的。也就是说，我不会为某个项目或计划而确定我的工作，用这些来改变我的工作态度和方法。一个艺术家追问的基本问题是什么，更为重要。简单来说，未知就是你的起点，而不是去做你已经知道的事情。未知是什么呢？它包含怀疑，以及对你弄不清楚的东西的一种工作。这种发问是持续性的，而且它无论在工作方式还是产生的形式的层面，你都不可能事先有所把握，那么你怎么决定呈现作品的时间可以如此准确？这个世界中，确定性占统治性地位太久了。如果有个展览，有个标题，有个观念，然后我就出蓝图，开始制作——我要这样吗？我在尝试一个不是这样的生产方式。我没有蓝图，我不知道这个东西多久能做完，甚至我不知道这个工作做完后是否可以被称作“艺术”。在这种条件下，就没有预设，没有目的地。所以，这之前的几个展览是以这样的工作方式产生、呈现。而且，我想切断流行的社会学、政治思潮、仿佛不言自明的关系与艺术家工作的直接关联。比如说，我们总拿当下时尚的东西来与艺术家的工作产生一种直接关联，表面看起来有效，但我认为这种有效极大地伤害了作为艺术本身的那个东西。所以说，话说到这里，就可以回答刚才你的那个问题，我的工作的变化一定不是景观意义上的变化，这是第一。

第二，艺术家可以不进步。艺术家不是为了进步而存在的，艺术家的工作是对未来、对现在的不信任。我所说的“进步”是在某种资本主义逻辑下的那种进步，就是你挣了一块钱就必须要挣两块。那么这种线性逻辑上的进步，首先很残酷，而且是一种对于艺术作品的荒谬判断，它不是鉴定艺术作品和艺术家工作的唯一方式。也许，持续十年、二十年，这种进步不在景观和可视性上，但艺术家一直在工作，那这部分工作怎么呈现出来呢？所以，我觉得，如果总在要求一个人在外观上展示自己是否进步的话，这个指标是值得怀疑的。那么用什么指标来确定这个人确实进步了呢？一旦这个东西明确了，那我觉得就更可怕了。

Wang Jianwei (hereinafter referred to as “Wang”): Actually, your question reminds me whether one question sometimes involves another one behind it. I mean an artist’s work needs change. However, if that change turns into a psychological need, it will evolve into a requirement for landscape, which cannot refect his attitude. So, I believe that “change”means, in fact, repeated suspicion of the artist’s previous creation. So, he will distrust things before his eyes, which is more significant than unceasingly pursuing superficial landscape change in works. This involves how the artist works. For example, I spent as long as one year preparing for “Time Temple” series, which turned out to be on exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum. Later, my solo exhibition “Dirty Substance” opened in Long March Space. Recently, I went for the Qatar exhibition. However, to tell you the truth, my work in the studio didn’t change. How do you understand this? In recent years I’ve been thinking: what’s an artist’s work on earth? How can I try a way of working not for exhibition, and exhibition time and space are related to my studio work at the same time? The three exhibitions I just mentioned share certain continuity. In other words, I will NOT schedule my work for a given project. Nor will I change my work attitude and method for the same reason. So, what fundamental questions an artist continually asks is more important. To put it simply, the unknown should be your starting point, and don’t do what you’ve already known. Then, what is the unknown? That involves distrust or anything you can’t figure out. And such questioning is continual, and you can’t control in advance how it works or what forms it takes. Then, how can you decide upon the time when your works are ready for display so exactly? In this world, certainty has occupied a dominant place for too long! If any exhibition notice pops out with a topic or a concept, then I work out a blueprint, and my preparation begins….shall I follow this way? No. What I’ve been trying is not this. I have no blueprint. Nor do I know when my creation will be done, or whether the final outcome can be called “art”! Under such conditions, no presupposition, no intentionality. This is exactly how I worked and presented my works for recent exhibitions. And I wanted to cut off the direct relationship between pop sociology, political thoughts, or anything seemingly self-evident and the artist’s work. For example, we’re inclined to resort to something fashionable to relate to the artist's work directly. Superficially, this looks effective, but I argue that this is an immense harm to art itself. Well now, let me come back to your question. The change in my work will NEVER be that in a sense of landscape. This is my frst point.

Second, the artist may choose not to progress. He does not exist for the sake of progress. His job is to distrust the future and the present alike. I say “progress” based on kind of capitalist logic that you have one dollar with you, and you force yourself to own two. This lineally logic progress, frst of all, is very cruel! It, too, is an absurd judgment of artwork, which shouldn’t be the only way to criticize an artist or his works. It is possible that we cannot discover progress in an artist from landscape and visibility within one or two decades, but he keeps growing professionally through those years. Then, how can this growth show itself? So, I believe if we always urge someone to reveal his progress in an apparent manner, then this index is quite doubtful. Well, is there any desirable index? Anyway, once such a thing is made clear, it would be even more terrible!

汪建伟 表面的肖像No. 1 布面油画 200×300 cm（中）162×112 cm（左+右） 2011年Wang Jianwei, The Portrait on the Surface No. 1, oil on canvas, 200×300 cm (middle), 162×112 cm (left+right), 2011

艾：我被您的回答拍晕了。

Ai: I’m just baffed by your answer!

汪：怎么会？不过，你不给我采访提纲是好的。

Wang: Really? However, it is better that you didn’t give me an outline.

艾：通常采访会从一个最近事件开始切入，所以我会问这个问题。每个艺术家的思路不太一样，有的艺术家会直接告诉我近况，但您进入到另一个层面去思考这个问题了。

Ai: Usually, an interview will start from a recent event. That’s why I asked that question. Every artist has his or her own way of thinking. Some may tell me directly about their current situation. But you entered into a different level for that.

汪：我没有“最近”。就像你问“生命”，对于我来说，它就是一个主语，就和“你活得怎么样”差不多的意思。但我没有活在“最近”，而有些工作是持续性的。

艾：我看您的展览履历，您参加了很多的群展。在群展中，您和别的艺术家会有怎样的沟通或相互影响？您看到了别人或作品中什么有趣的点，别人可能又看到你的什么有意思的点？作为艺术史，这种相互影响很有趣。

汪：首先，我可以坦率地告诉你，有趣的不光是艺术家。从九十年代开始，我理解当代艺术正好就是因为我背叛当代艺术。因为我觉得，它只是人类知识的一部分。我恰恰是从人类其他的知识里看到了比艺术还要艺术的一些东西，想象力、怀疑态度、工作方式和看问题的方式，比如说物理学。科学带给我的是全方位的、对某一个固定不变认识的颠覆。所以，我从来没有认为，一个学科、一种方式认识世界是最有趣的。否则，就变得很无趣了。第二个错误在于，我们觉得这个世界进步了。大家不是喜欢科学和哲学吗？那好，艺术、哲学、科学，三个加起来一定是一个更有意思的东西吗？恰恰错了。它们之间唯一产生关联的，不是联合，而是拆台。任何一个知识在今天，我的理解是，知识综合最关键的一点，不是联合起来变成无懈可击的铜墙铁壁的知识，反而是相互拆台。说得理论一点，就是相互质疑。只有这样，你才能保持所有知识，不能在任何地方形成一种独裁。否则，你学历史就告诉别人历史是唯一能够认识世界的钥匙，学哲学的说是哲学。那我们是否只要拥有了这样一种知识，就可以把它变成一种独裁？而这种东西最后会导致你的世界观、你要求别人的世界观，都一样。我恰恰在今天的很多知识分子身上就看到了这种独裁，一种说教式的、唯一的、认为知识的积累是属于伟大的——这是非常大的问题。所以，任何一个地方，你都会看到“有趣”，不光是艺术。

第二，我常常获得“有趣”的地方是我不熟悉的领域。比如我的惊喜，我的知识上的惊喜、工作上的惊喜或者其他，都产生于对“已知”的抑制。

Wang: For me there’s no “recently”. Just like you ask me about“life.” Personally, it’s a mere subject, like “How are things with you?”But I didn’t live in “recent”, and some of my work remains ongoing.

Ai: I saw your exhibition experience. You attended many group exhibitions. How did you communicate or interact with other artists then? Did you fnd any fun in other artists or their works? Or did they fnd any fun in you? As in art history, such interaction is so interesting.

Wang: First, to be frank, not only artists are fun. Since the 1990s, I can understand contemporary art just because I’m its traitor. In my eyes it is only part of human knowledge, and I’ve discovered what’s more like art in other parts! Say, imagination, skeptical attitude, how one works, and how one look at things…yeah, physics is an example. Science brings me an all-round subversion, which smashes to anything changeless. So, I never believe any discipline or any way of knowing about the world is the most fun. Otherwise it’ll be terribly dull. The second mistake is we have a feeling that the world has progressed. Don’t you like science and philosophy? All right. Art, philosophy, science. If the three add up, must the result be more fun? No. We’re wrong, absolutely. The only thing that connects them is not uniting, but fghting against each other. Today, I believe it is crucial that know-hows shall not be so united to form something hard to break up. On the contrary, they should be able to cut each other’s throats! In theoretical words, they should question each other. Only by so doing can you keep know-hows from creating a monopoly in any feld. Otherwise, if you’re a history learner, you may tell others that history is the only key to knowing about the world. If you’re a philosophy learner, your answer will be philosophy. Then, are we right when we make a know-how a monopoly? That, eventually, may lead to the fact you may ask others to develop a world view exactly the same as yours! I’ve discovered such a monopoly in many intellectuals, who assume that know-how accumulation is great. Very teachy, very bossy. This is a BIG problem. So, you’ll fnd “fun” anywhere, not only in art.

Second, I often find “fun” in a field which I’m not familiar with. For example, my pleasant surprise, either from learning or from work or somewhere else, all comes from my restraint of “what I’ve already known.”

最后，在整个工作过程中，我和艺术家是没有来往的，只有在展览上有来往。这种偶然性没有必要变成一个故事。有时候，可能会碰见一个艺术家或策展人，会有聊天，但这个与日常生活里你跟其他人，其他行业的、不同年龄的、不认识的人的交流，是同样处于能获取惊喜的途径。所以，在获取惊喜的路上，任何对象是平等的。比如，今天我接受你的采访，我不期望有什么惊喜，但是说不定就会有。但你是不是艺术家，是不是我期待的某个职业的某种人，这些都不重要。我想再举个例子，在一个朋友的聚会上，有一个医生说道，他的病人得了癌症，就把家产都变卖了，准备去当和尚，想着死掉算了。这个病人找到他看病，他就跟病人说了真实想法。他说，你知道癌症是什么吗？癌症是寄居在活着的正常人的机体里的细胞，它也不希望你死，癌症希望你活着。病人听了以后，觉得这个逻辑好像是对的啊。我听到以后就想，这是辩证法吗？这种辩证地看世界的方式，你不觉得在任何一个地方，你都可能听见吗？它不见得非得在艺术界。所以，我觉得，艺术只有丧失了它的特殊性，才会回到一个普遍价值的意义上。那么，有趣会发生在任何一个场所、任何一个时间、任何一种知识、任何一个人。

Finally, I have no contacts with other artists throughout the process, except during exhibitions. But that sort of accidental meeting doesn’t have to become another story. Sometimes, you come across an artist or a curator, and you have a chat together. But in your daily life, you get same surprise from people from other walks, of different ages, familiar or unfamiliar. So, no difference. For example, you see, now I’m receiving your interview, and I don’t expect any surprise, but maybe it will occur. Anyhow it doesn’t matter whether you’re an artist or someone from some profession I’m looking forward to. Another example. It was a story told by a doctor at a friend’s party. He said one of his patients got a cancer, and sold all his properties, almost planning to be a monk in a monastery and end up there. When he came to him for treatment, the doctor told him his true ideas. He said, “Do you know what a cancer is? It’s a lot of cells living on a normal human body. Even they themselves don’t want you to die; they want you to survive!” The patient listened, and thought the logic was quite right. Later, I began to think: “Is this dialectic? Don’t you think you can come across this way of dialectically watching the world anywhere, not necessarily in art circles? So, I think, only when art loses its particularity will it return to a universal sense. That’s why fun may occur anywhere, anytime, in any feld of knowledge, and to any person.

艾：我觉得您很有趣，因为对于我的问题，您总能回到自己的知识框架里，用自己的话语来指出我提问本身可能存在的问题。

Ai: I find you very interesting. You always return to your own knowledge framework to answer my questions, and point out with your own discourse possible mistakes I’ve made in my questions.

汪：你不觉得这就是碰撞吗？但我不是用艺术的东西跟你碰撞，我举这个例子就是，我的有趣来自于一个医学博士。我把这个有趣传达给你，你可能也会觉得有趣。

艾：日常生活中，除了工作，您还做什么有趣的事情？

汪：我觉得我做的事都挺有趣的。不过，要知道什么有趣，首先得知道什么是没趣。有的人说，你做这件事情有趣，那间接地批判了你做这件事以外的其他事情都是无趣的。但是我恰恰相反。有趣不可以从你的日常生活中滴漏出来，它不能被作为一类被单独提出来。我经常会听到别人说，开心一点吧。听起来没错。但这句话的另一个逻辑是，这个人一点不开心。还有人说，做开心的事。那我马上就想，开心的事儿，是什么事儿？是不是人只做这个事就开心，但这只是一种动作。如果这个人一辈子都做这个动作，只做开心的动作，这个人会开心吗？一辈子只做、只想开心的事儿，这是很乏味的事情，因为就那么一点儿。所以我认为，说开心的事的时候，你能不能知道什么是开心，什么是不开心。不能简单地把你的世界和生活理解为开心或不开心，这样的话，你就真的很“开心”。

艾：实际上，我想问，您感兴趣的事情对您的创作有怎样的影响？但您不愿意把自己的工作限制在艺术的范畴里。那么，我应该以如何的话语来向您提出问题，这本身成为了一个问题。

汪：我可以换一个方式来回答你这个问题。首先，我可以讲，我怎么理解艺术，和我是怎么用我理解的方法来学会了我所理解的艺术。其实当时我正在插队，我的朋友说，你学画画吧。在今天我们认为那个叫艺术，今天我们说这两个字的时候已经注入很多很崇高的东西了，但当时就叫“学画画”，是学一门技术，与世界观没有关系。实际上，一开始，技术就介入了艺术。但我们现在一直不认为这个人学了画画，学了艺术，是学了一个技术。“技术”就失去了主导地位。所以我要重现“技术”的重要性，里面有时间性、实践和所有和身体有关的东西。到了后边，如果这种东西还在或者不在，这直接涉及到一个艺术家的工作和你的身体、实践、时间到底有多大关系。

那么，第二个层面，为什么要学习这门技术？为什么没有学习钓鱼，学习其他东西？我用“匮乏”来描述。“匮乏”不是很多人理解的“缺少”，实际上是我经常说的“已知的匮乏”。多少年前，我自己并不知道，多年来我不断对这个行为进行理解，包括我对现在工作的理解，我认为每一次都是从这里开始的，就是“已知的匮乏”。今天不是缺少产生需求，是我们能不能在我们的丰富里看到“缺少”。我认为，已知就是最大的敌人，生活在已知里是最大的缺憾，最大的匮乏。要从已知的匮乏里不断地突围。这就回到我最初说过的，我总是从未知开始，而且是持续性的。很多人说，汪老师你八十年代画画得了奖，然后你放弃了，做了多媒体。很多艺术家也放弃了，但我的问题是说，放弃一次只是一个放弃，但有区别，放弃、对未知的怀疑、对确定性的不信任的态度应该是终身的。所以我在杭州，郑胜天老师的讨论会（注：2016年举办的“世纪：SHENG PROJECT”第二次策展工作坊）上，我说了两点：第一，“无主之地”是什么概念？从一个领域逃到另一个，不是一次就够了，然后就享受逃离的成果。第二，“背叛”对于艺术家来讲是终身的，就是背叛已知。绘画的艺术家做了视频，就成了影像艺术家了，但我的问题是，你能背叛影像艺术吗？你还可以背叛，因为我不相信，持续二十年的这件事你还有兴趣。而且你们不是常常说画画二十年不敢背叛的人没有创新吗？结果，你们做录像也做了二十年，这不是一样的道理吗？我觉得，一次性背叛，你可以享受它的成果，但不断地背叛，你的成果是零。所以，对已知的背叛来自于你认识到对已知的匮乏。比如波粒二象性互补、测不准原理、量子理论的既相互制约又相互依存，这些东西你在艺术史里看得到吗？但这个世界存在于这些看不到的部分。这种看世界的方式不是虚构的，不是“神”。

Wang: Don’t you take this as an interaction? But I do not interact with you artistically. The story I just told is an example—fun from a doctor of medicine, and I transferred this fun to you. And you may feel the same.

Ai: In daily life, apart from work, what other fun do you have?

Wang: I think everything I do is fun. To know what’s fun, we frst have to know what’s not fun. If some say what you’re doing is fun, that is an indirect denying that anything else you do is fun. But I’m just on the opposite. Fun doesn’t seep from daily life, and it can’t be singled out. I often hear “Be cheerful!” That sounds fne. But the other logic behind this is that this person addressed to is uncheerful. Others may say: “Do happy things.” Then that reminds me immediately: what’s a happy thing? Does it mean that person will be happy as long as he does it? However, it’s a mere act. If he only does that all his life, will he be happy? No! Instead it would be unbearably boring. So, when it comes to a happy thing, can you tell me what it is and what it isn’t? Never simply mark your world or life: happy or unhappy. If you follow my advice, you’ll be surely “happy.”

Ai: Actually, I wanted to ask: what infuence your interesting things have had upon your creation? However, you’re unwilling to limit your work to the sphere of art. Well—how should I put my question to you—in what discourse? This becomes a question itself.

Wang: I can answer your question in another way. First of all, I can tell you how I understand art, and how I learned the art as I understand it in my own way. That was in my youth when China was politically swept by the Up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside Movement, and I was sent to live and work in a production team in a village. I followed a friend’s advice and began to learn drawing. Today we call it art, and take it as something quite noble. But at that time it was known as nothing but drawing, just a craft, having nothing to do with world view. In fact, craft intervened in art at its outset. However, today we are always reluctant to admit that drawing is a craft. So “craft” has lost its original dominance. So I attach much importance to “craft”, which involves temporality, practice and everything concerned with the human body. Later, as to whether this sort of thing still exists, that directly involves how much an artist’s work has to do with your body, practice, and time after all.

Then, at the second level, why do we learn this craft, not fishing or anything else? I’d like to use the word “deficiency” to describe. Mind you, not “shortage” as many would believe it. To tell the truth, I often call it “deficiency in the known.” I didn’t recognize that many years ago. Through all these years I’ve been seeking to understand this behavior, including my present work. I believe I restart to do so from here—“defciency in the known” every time. What matters today is not that shortage creates demand, but whether we can see “shortage” from our “abundance.” The known, I argue, is our biggest enemy; living in the known is our biggest regret, and our biggest defciency. We need to repeatedly fght our way out through the wall of the known defciency. This precisely comes back to what I said at first—I always start from the unknown, unceasingly. Many people tell me: “Mr. Wang, you won drawing prizes in the eighties, and then you gave up, and turned to multimedia!” Likewise, many other artists gave up, too. However, giving up itself is just one act. What I’m emphasizing is: our giving up, suspicion of the unknown and distrust of certainty should last lifelong! That’s why I raised two points at the seminar organized by Mr. Zheng Shengtian in Hangzhou (in the second curatorial workshop of “Century: SHENG PROJECT”, held in 2016): frst, what is “No Man’s Land’? It means retreating from one feld to another, not just completing such an act and enjoying the fruits of escape. Second, “betraying” is a lifelong matter for an artist—betraying the known. An artist may drop out of drawing and embrace videoing. But my question is: can you betray video art once again? Yes, you can! I never believe you can lock your interest to that for two decades. Moreover, remember your pet saying that an artist will come to nothing innovative if he’s kept himself to drawing for twenty years and still is afraid to betray? I bet the same will happen to you if you’re with videoing. I believe you can enjoy the fruit of one-time betrayal, but if you keep betraying, the fruit you can depend to enjoy is zero. So, the betrayal of the known comes from the fact that you have recognized your defciency in the unknown. For example, wave-particle duality complementarity principle, uncertainty principle, quantum theory, all these suppress yet depend on each other. Can you see these things in art history?! So, this world, actually, lies in those parts you cannot see. This way of looking at the world is not purely conceived in mind, not“mysterious.”

在思考的过程中，我对那些“大词”所指向的世界，几乎是不信任的。比如，命运、人类，这种词没有“物”，没有一个指向，只有说出这个词的时候的快感。但这种快感是对真实世界的一种伤害。所以我不使用这些词。对“已知的匮乏”的突围技术是什么，就是物，就是我所说的艺术。

In the process of thinking, I hardly trust the worlds those“big words” refer to, say, fate, human beings. Such words have no directionality. You just get an immediate pleasure from speaking them out. However, such a feeling is harmful to the real world. So, I never use them. And what’s the weapon you can rely on when you fght your way out through the defciency of the known? The answer is: objects and art as I understand it.

汪建伟 ……或者事件导致了每一个无效的结果 综合媒介 尺寸可变 2013年Wang Jianwei, …Or an Accident Leads to Every Ineffective Result, mixed media, variable size, 2013

艾：您之前提到过您的作品《时间寺》与《巴别图书馆》有一定的联系。那么，您怎么遇到了这本书？

Ai: You mentioned your workTime Templehas certain connection toThe Library of Babel. How did you encounter this book?

汪：1983年遇到的。我在相当长的一段时间的理想是当一个作家，并不是做绘画。一个是因为，当作家技术成本很低，绘画在当时的成本还是比较高的。第二，我从农村直接去了部队。部队根本没有条件让你成为画家。我跟几十个人就睡在一个大屋子里，所以不可能允许任何脱离规定动作的动作。这个经历给了我一笔遗产，一直到现在，就是对集体的极其反感。我实在不能忍受一群人以一种方式说话、一种态度去思考问题，无论好坏，都有些偏执了。还有对权力的敏感。排长可以骂班长，班长可以骂副班长，老兵骂新兵，最后变成，从话语方式、行为方式等方面都被渗透了权力。我对在知识层面、公共秩序层面等话语的权力极其敏感。

Wang: That was in 1983. In fact, for quite a long time in my life I dreamed to be a writer, not an artist. Partly because it was less costly to be a writer than to be an artist then. Partly because conditions didn’t allow me to be an artist—I left the countryside and served in the army, when scores of us shared a spacious bedroom at night. Impossible for me to do anything not permitted. This experience left me a legacy—-a strong aversion to collectivism (even today I hate collectivism). I really couldn’t stand a group of people speak and think the same way, for better or worse! Kind of paranoid. Moreover, I was easily offended by authority. I found a platoon leader could fercely rebuke a squad leader under him; a squad leader could treat a vice squad leader under him thus; and so could a veteran to a recruit. As a result authority was penetrated into discourse and behavior. I’m extremely sensitive to the power of discourse at intellectual or public order levels.

汪建伟 隔离 综合媒介 尺寸可变 2009年Wang Jianwei, Partition, mixed media, variable size, 2009

汪建伟 黄灯 影像部分手稿之11 2011Manuscript 11, video part of Yellow Lamp, 2011

汪建伟 黄灯 影像部分手稿之12 2011Manuscript 12, video part of Yellow Lamp, 2011

So I read extensively, and kept writing as a habit in the army. In 1983, I began to read Jorge Luis Borges. At that time, Shanghai Translation Publishing House launchedA Collection of Borges’ Stories. For the frst time in my life I learned two words from him: “non-linear”and “synchronic.” When I createdTime Temple, I felt the seed of the concept of “time” had been buried in my mind thirty years before. In thefeld of humanities, the concept of “time” was offered to me through two very important people: Borges and the artist Francis Bacon. They led me to comprehension of time from two completely different directions. Of course, physics and philosophy also helped me understand time and contemporaneity. However, these two figures were the earliest to help me perceive and recognize the importance of time. Why Bacon? I fell in love with him at the very frst, which would be hard to understand if just from the perspective of art history. Many years later, when I read Gilles Deleuze’s book on Bacon, I wrote down Bacon’s words (which he told Deleuze) on the front cover: “Why can a drawing appeal to our nervous system directly? This is a most rigorous and challenging question.” Here I judge Bacon believes that a drawing can present a general time that is juxtaposed by several times—a “surface.” Finally, I learned from William Butler Yeats that the most complex is skin. In 2011, I resumed drawing. And my first piece wasThe Portrait on the Surface. Yes, that yellow strip. Without any trace of hand-drawing. Very industrialized. Suddenly immersive. And without warning! This is time. I’ve noted that a lot of people imitate this, but from a symbol view, not from time science.

所以在部队，我大量阅读，自己坚持写东西。1983年我开始阅读博尔赫斯。当时上海译文出版社出版了《博尔赫斯小说集》。第一次，我从他那儿学到了几个词：非线性、共时性。到我做《时间寺》的时候，我觉得，“时间”这个概念的种子在三十年前就种下了。在人文领域，“时间”这个概念由两个很重要的人物带给我，一个是博尔赫斯，一个是画家培根。他们让我从两个完全不同的方向，让我理解了时间。当然，物理学、哲学也带给我对于时间、当代性的理解，但这两位是很早让我感受到、意识到时间的重要的人。为什么是培根？一开始我就很喜欢他，但如果只是说美术史层面，很难理解。但很多年之后，我看德勒兹写培根的那本书，把培根告诉他的一句话用到封面上：“一幅画为什么能够直接诉诸神经系统，这是一个非常严密、非常难的问题。”但我从培根的话里发觉，他认为绘画可以表现一个各种时间并置在一起的一般性的那个时间，那就是“表面”。最后我从叶兹的诗才理解到，最复杂的是皮肤。2011年，我恢复绘画的第一幅画叫《表面的肖像》，就是这个黄条，一个没有手绘痕迹的、非常工业化的、突然浸入的。毫无征兆地发生，这就是时间。我现在看来好多人模仿这个东西，但他们是从一个符号的角度，不是从时间学上过来的。

汪建伟 欢迎来到真实的沙漠 多媒体剧场 尺寸可变 2010 年Wang Jianwei, Welcome to the Desert of the Real, multimedia theater, variable size, 2010

艾：黄条的“共时性”是如何体现的呢？但是否用话语去解释画面又是无力的呢？

Ai: How is the synchronicity of the yellow strip represented? Or is it weak to interpret the drawing with discourse?

汪：对。我的黄条就是我理解的时间。这只是我的一部分，在我的影像、戏剧里，就经常出现这个“黄条”。我说的“黄条”是类似的时间不同的介入。这是对当代艺术的“当代”二字的基本认识。它是从戏剧和电影带来。

《巴比图书馆》还没说完。《交叉小径的花园》是让我

Wang: Yes. The yellow strip is the time as I understand it. This is only part of me, which appears often in my videos and drama. As I said the strip is a different intervention of similar times. This is a basic understanding of “contemporary,” as in contemporary art. It comes from drama and flms.

I’m not fnished withThe Library of Babel.Actually,The Garden of Forking Pathsmoved me earlier. But when I readThe Library of Babel, I began to think it’s the most delightful part in Borges works. Order, logic, chaos, time. Sometimes, he retains all nouns in a sentence, but changes their word order, which then directly leads to the collapse of time! For example, I give a normal description: today I met a girl wearing glasses, sitting on my sofa. Now, if I say: “The sofa glasses girl is looking at me.” The words are the same in the sentence, but the subject, predicate and object all have changed. So, all of sudden, the time has changed with the way you read, and your reading is directly linked最先激动的，但我读了《巴比图书馆》以后，一直认为这是我看到的博尔赫斯作品中最喜欢的东西。秩序、逻辑、混乱、时间。而有的时候，他让一个句子的名词都在，但句子中词语顺序变化了，直接导致了句子产生的时间完全崩溃。比如，我正常的描述是，我今天见了一个戴着眼镜的女孩，坐在我的沙发上。现在我这么说，沙发镜子的女孩在看我。前后两个词都可能在这个句子里，但这个句子的主语、谓语、宾语全部变了，导致突然这个时间就变了，因为你的阅读方式变了，你的阅读直接联系着你经验的时间的部分。它首先颠覆了你正常的看时间的方式。很多人只认识到，语言变成了一个你不理解的方式，但很大的程度上，实际上是颠覆的时间的方式。它非线性，所以有的人就不理解。所以时间就一点一点地渗透到为什么是这样。那么，为什么我在若干年以后做《时间寺》？就是一个物的时间，在无限度当中，如何产生了它的形式，就这么简单的一个事情。不是别人所理解的地区性、社会性。我就是想呈现，作为一个艺术家，我到底在想什么。我用了这么长时间，只是把自己的这样的工作带到了现场。to that part of time which you experience. It frst subverts the way you normally look at time. Many people only have realized that language has become something incomprehensible. But, in fact, to a larger extent, the way of time has been subverted: non-linear for this moment, which is hard to understand for some people. So time has thus been penetrated little by little and become what it is now. Then, why did I createTime Templea number of years later? Just for the sake of object’s time; how its form is created in infnite. That’s all. Not something regional or social as some may understand it. For my part, I just wanted to reveal what was in my mind as an artist in the end. And I spent such a long time just to take my work to the scene.

艾：那么，是否有一个时间的参照在那里，才会导致词序变化引发的时间变化呢？

Ai: Well, any time reference there, making it possible that change of word order leads to that of time?

汪：没有。这就是问题，我们总认为世界上总存在这样一个标准。所以，我们说的多样性，就已经暗含了时间这个东西。我觉得很难理解所谓的“中国的现代性”的说法。我们经常批判西方逻辑下的现代性，但是是因为它说得不对，还是因为是它说的？就像这两天我看到，某个人死了，大家都在问他怎么死的，然后所有人的解释是他嫖娼，这个逻辑是怎么建立起来的，我也很纳闷。我们要理解的是，他如何死的，不是说他是如何嫖娼的。这里面有两个东西：如果前一个逻辑，嫖娼成立，我们就没有必要这么在乎这个死。这是最邪恶的。我的展览“脏物”这个概念，其实就是这个概念，就是要亵渎一下现在这个，我们只有见到这个人才知道到底罪恶在哪里。但我们的认知本身就带有很多罪恶的东西，我们真的可以“得罪”它一下。“脏物”就是认知层面上“脏”，就相对于我们说的“干净”，就是你刚才说的“标准”。“脏物”就是在得罪“标准”。

我的工作在很大程度上就是在挑战“不言自明”。所以你跟我的谈话，或者和任何人的谈话，首先出来的第一句就可能成为一个问题。因为顺着这个说，实际是在重复这个问题，把这个问题变得合法。其实有时候，这第一句就是有问题的。就像你说，你是怎么为展览做准备的，这里面有问题。一个艺术家真的是在为展览做准备的吗？

艾：这里面可能有些预设。

汪：对，不是说这个描述错误。你知道为什么我会提“排演”这个词吗？其实就是提问。提问就不光是口头的提问，提问要带出行动来。我认为，以这种行动的方式提问就是排演。但排演不是方法，不是所有东西不停重来就一定会更好、更完美。排演只是让所有的事情重启、重启，让不信任的行动总是处于重启。这是戏剧带给我的工作，黄条也从这儿来。

通常情况下，我们会这么说，这个导演对自己的作品精益求精，不断地排演，让作品更完美。但我觉得这是个谎言。我从1999年，第一个剧场作品开始，完全在尝试一种新的呈现方式，就是“剧场”这个概念。但这些技术对我来说，百分之百是陌生的。这里充满了对未知的兴奋，因为这里有行动，不是纸面上的东西。我不知道如何建立我的团队，我一步一步地来。1998年，我开始筹备。你可以想象，哪个演员能够知道当代艺术。我通过朋友打听到，在两个酒吧有表演，就过去看。在酒吧里发现了当时在中戏读书的学生，他们在那儿做些表演。只有他们能够理解，我要的那个东西是什么。荒谬的是，他们没有一个是表演系的。第一次的演员全部是舞美系的。他们却有对当代艺术的装置和行为概念的理解。好了，音乐、影像、表演、灯光，全是这样一个一个地在我的经验之外去发现。到2003年的时候，做《仪式》的时候，我用了《三国演义》这个文本。其中有叫祢衡的人以及“击鼓骂曹”的典故。在中国历史上这个典故有三个不同的文本，这三个文本（注：《后汉书》《三国演义》《狂鼓史渔阳三弄》）其实就是三个问题。最初出现“祢衡”是在《后汉书》，第二次出现是在两百年以后。当时这个戏，有几个提问：第一个就是，“祢衡”这个人为什么他在两百年以后才出现。而且我要问，在这两百年之间，为什么没有一个人提起过他，而两百年以后的人比之前的人更熟悉他。这个问题直接指向了文本。

Wang: No. This is where the problem lies. We always think that there is such a standard in the world. When we mention diversity, we’ve already implied a thing: “time.” So, I find it very difficult for me to understand the idea of so-called “Chinese modernity.” We often criticize the Western logic’s modernity, because of its wrong, or because of the fact that it raised the issue? Just like a story recently covered in China. In a news event someone’s death caused a nationwide concern. Many were eager to know how he lost his life, but got an answer from every source that he went whoring! I was wondering how this logic was established. What we’re so hungry to know is how he died, not how he visited an unlawful prostitute. You see, there are two things in the story: whoring and death. If the former is proven, it seems that there’s no need for us to care how his life was claimed. This is the wickedest logic in the world! That’s why I exhibited my work “Dirty Substance”, just to dishonor what’s going on today. Only after we see that person can we know what evil it’s about. However, our cognizance itself contains much evil. We indeed may give it a dishonor. In truth “Dirty Substance” is cognitively“dirty,” opposite to what we call “clean”, and the “standard” you implied just now. It is precisely a dishonor to “standard.”

My job, largely, is to challenge something “self-evident.” So, when you talk to me, or talk to anyone else, your frst sentence may become a problem itself. If I follow your way, actually I’m repeating that problem and “legalizing” it. Yes, in some cases, your first sentence may be problematic. For example, if you ask me: “How did you prepare for this exhibition?” This question is self-questionable: is that true that an artist works for exhibitions?

Ai: There may be some presets inside.

Wang: Yeah. I’m not saying that your description is wrong. You know why I would mention the word “semi-staging”? In fact, it is question-asking. It is done not only orally, but also by action. I think that question-asking by action is “semi-staging”. However, “semi-staging”is not a method. Nor is it that all things must be further better and more desirable if they repeatedly come on. “Semi-staging” is but restarting, putting an untrustworthy action always in a restart model. This is what drama has taught me. And my inspiration for the yellow strip also came from this source.

Habitually, people agree that a director who keeps rehearsal of his works is a self-starter, to make his works better than ever. But, in my eyes this is untrue. Let me speak from experience. In 1999, I started to experiment with my frst “theater” artwork, a completely new presentation. Relevant techniques were one hundred percent strange to me. But I was full of excitement to the unknown because there was action, not just paper work. At that time I didn’t know how to create my team, so I had to go ahead step by step. Even as early as in 1998, my preparation had begun. You can imagine how many actors I could fnd who knew about contemporary art. With the help of a friend of mine, I learned that performances were given in two bars. There, I found a few student actors from the Central Academy of Drama. Only they could understand what I was after. The absurd thing was that none of them was from Performing Department! Some of them the first time I met were all from Stage Art Department. Anyway they understood the concepts of installation and performance in contemporary art. All right, music, video, performance, light—everything—I needed to overcome one by one, without previous experience to support. In 2003, when I was creatingCeremony,I used the text ofThe Romance of the Three Kingdoms. In it there was a historical fgure called Mi Heng, a learned celebrity with upright character. He was humiliated by the tyrant Cao Cao, and was courageous to throw out rightful curses at him as a drumming offcer in the army in a ceremony. Historically, there were three different versions of the text in China:History of Eastern Han, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, andThe Afterlife Story of Mi Heng the Fearless Drummer.The name Mi Heng first appeared inHistory of Eastern Han. It was two hundred years later that it reappeared. Here arise my doubts: why didn’t his name turn up again until two hundred years later? Why didn’t anybody mention him for so long? Why were the later generations more familiar with this fgure than the earlier ones? All these questions directly point to the “text.”

艾：还有历史的问题。

汪：对。我当时正着迷美国新历史主义小组，他们受到福柯影响，关于“历史的文本和文本的历史”的概念。两个是并置的、不可相互替代的。历史的文本很好解释，就是现在我们看到的这些东西。但是文本的历史是什么？我的《仪式》就是在关注这个。没有被记录下来的历史就不存在。也就是说这两百年之间，没有这个文本，所以这个历史就不存在。也就是说“祢衡”在这两百年是不存在的。

我在其中提出的第二个问题是，所有的文本只纪录了一个事情，就是他老是在骂人，他最后把人骂火了，被人杀掉了。其他什么都没有记录。那么，为什么除了骂还是骂？他有病吗？他是生理上的病，还是别人需要他有病就够了，等等。

Ai: Also, historical issues are involved.

Wang: Yes. I was just crazy about the American New Historicism Group, who was influenced by Michel Foucault on the concepts of “historical text & text history.” The two were juxtaposed, not interchangeable. A historical text is easy to explain, just like what we see today. But what is a text history? This was what myCeremonyconcerned. A history that hasn’t been recorded does not exist. That is to say, through that period of two hundred years, there was no text as such. Nor did its history exist as a result. In other words Mi Heng didn’t exist through the two centuries.

Moreover, only one thing about him was recorded in all the texts—he always cursed. Eventually, someone flew into rage and killed him. No other records at all. Then my follow-up questions are: why did he do nothing but cursing? Was he sick? Was he physically sick, or someone else just needed him to be sick and that’s enough?

排练的时候，有趣的事情出来了。我第一次用了面具。戴上面具的时候，他们在演文本，放下面具的时候，他们在讨论这个文本。也就是说，演戏的人和评论者都在演戏。那么，排练的时候就出问题了，这个东西怎么排？当时我只意识到复杂，但没有意识到什么叫“时间”，也不知道最后排演的是什么。在欧洲巡回演出，最后去了蓬皮杜艺术中心。从那次开始，我开始理解“排演”这个概念。三场以后，我们还要不要排演？四场、五场、十几场，我就在想，为什么要排演这个东西？那么，这里的时间和时间的行动是什么意义？实际上，在排演的时候，以前做过什么，已经不重要了，因为如果重要，你认为哪场最重要，那就没有必要再排演了。所以在采取这个行动的时候，过去已经不重要了。同时，你采取行动之前，未来还不存在，是不是？你必须要行动。排演就是“现在”，这就是我理解的排演。当时我给“新星星艺术节”写什么叫“新”的时候，最后一句话是，新就是对过去和未来都不负责任的一次突然的行动。这实际也是我理解的“排演”。在这样的背景下，怎么可能有一个对未来那么有预设性的东西呢？排演就是重启，它不是方法，重启就是一个问题。导演常常说，再来再来。我觉得，再来就是归零。

When it was rehearsal-time, a funny thing happened. I used the masks for the frst time. While they were on the masks, they were acting out the text; while they were off the masks, they were discussing the text. You see, all the actors and the critic were acting. Then, a problem popped out: how should the rehearsing go? At that moment, I just realized it’s complex, but didn’t realize what was “time.” Nor did I know what the outcome of the rehearsal would be. Later, we gave our touring performances in Europe, and went to Le Centre Pompidou fnally. It was from then that I began to understand the concept of “semi-staging.” After three performances, I began to ask myself: “Shall we give additional performances, the fourth, the fifth, the tenth, or even more? Why the semi-staging? And what are the meanings of time and the action of time here?” In fact, while the semi-staging is going on, what has been done before no longer matters, because if the past is important and you can judge which rehearsal is the most important, additional semi-staging will be unnecessary. So, when this action is taken, the past is not important any more. At the same time, before you take action, the future does not exist, right? So you must act. Semi-staging means “the present,” as I understand it. I remember when I wrote for “New Star Art Festival,” I described “newness” in the ending sentence as a sudden action which is responsible neither for the past nor for the future. This is also how I understand “semi-staging.” Judging from such a context, how can we have a thing like a preset for the future? Semi-staging is restart, not a method; restart means a problem. A director often says: “Let’s do it again!” For me that means zeroing.

艾：观众是不是被排除掉了？

汪：我觉得，不需要考虑观众。这听起来非常不道德，但世界上最道德的是，不考虑观众。因为你是用你自己去考虑观众的，是你想象出来的一种对你的行为事先作抵押的虚构的人群。你想象出一种为你服务的人，你把他安排在观众头上，是对真实观众最大的亵渎。如果你认为观众跟社会、现实关系很大，就像我们对“人民”这个词一样，这就是一个彻底的极权主义。观众是什么，从来就不存在这样一个命名。有个我举过一万遍的例子：我们两个坐在这里，你能告诉我谁是观众，谁不是？

艾：但这里不是剧场。

汪：如果在讨论谁是观众的时候，还要想是否在剧场，这就更荒谬了。说回来，我们两个是或不是观众，答案只有两个。说不是，我要问为什么不是，说是，那我们就是。我觉得，我做的事情就是观众做的事情。我觉得这更真实。因为我也是观众的一部分。这是第一个解释。第二个解释是，你这时候想象的观众就是通过你的教育和知识所建立起来的、被控制的虚构。我举过例子，窗外坐着的一个人，他就是你的观众，请你虚构一下他。你可以写十页纸或者一页纸，关于这个人怎么看你。你给他看一看，你都不好意思。因为这个行动就不合法，你在替别人看问题；而且十页纸或者一页纸是一个意义，是你对他看世界的一种想象，是不是他，他同意不同意，百分之多少同意，都跟他没关系。一个人你都搞不定，你怎么能搞定所有观众呢？

Ai: Is the audience excluded?

Wang: No need to care about them, I think. Sounds very immoral. But the most moral thing in the world is not to care about them. Because when you’re caring about them, you’re doing so from your own position, and the audience is a crowd that you have imagined and pledged for your future behavior. So, you have imagined such a group to serve your purpose and name them the audience. This, I believe, is the ultimate blasphemy to the real audience! Further, if you think that the audience has much to do with society and reality, as we treat the word “people,”that would be a downright totalitarianism. There has never been a name as such. Again, I’d like to cite this example as I have done so hundreds of times: you see, we two are sitting here, can you tell who’s the audience and who’s not?

Ai: But we’re not in the theater.

Wang: It would be even more absurd if you are discussing who’s the audience, and wondering whether you’re in the theater at the same time. Well, let’s come back to the previous question whom of us is the audience. We have but two choices. If the answer is “No,” I’ll ask why not. If the answer is “Yes,” then we are. I believe I’ve been doing what the audience does. I think that’s more real because I myself am also part of the audience. This is No. 1 explanation. No. 2 explanation is this: the audience you imagine at this moment is built through your education or knowledge—a controlled conception. Here’s an example. A man sitting outside the window is your audience. Please imagine him. You can write one page or ten pages of his opinions of you. Show him what you’ve written. I bet you’ll be awfully embarrassed about what you’ve done. The reason is: this action is “illegal”—you are thinking of him as if you were him. What’s more, whatever you’ve written about him—one page or ten—is just an imagination, and has nothing to do with him, no matter whether he agrees or no matter what percentage of your account he will agree to. You see, you can’t get things right with a single person, how can you get all of the audience?

观众就是一个“社会”。我唯一能接受观众这个概念的时刻是，它是充满差异的个体所组成的。那么保存这种差异并存的事实，那不就是最真实的吗？既然如此，我不考虑观众，就捍卫了观众最真实的一面。我跟他不一样，我捍卫我跟他的不一样，我不去用我来想象他跟我一样。我的作品，很多人说，汪老师，我看不懂。恰恰我就是捍卫了你和我的差异。

艾：您喜欢的作家，除了博尔赫斯，还有谁？

汪：卡夫卡。我有一个很长的清单。但这个清单有时可以具体到一本书。我淘汰了很多作家，最后留下来的就是卡夫卡的东西多一点，像《城堡》就是我特别喜欢的。还有加缪的《局外人》对我的文字书写产生过很大影响，但我不提加缪其他的东西。普伊格的《蜘蛛女之吻》，印象也特别深。

艾：您提到之前想当作家，那么作家对您影响更多还是艺术家？

汪：最近十年对我影响更多的还是科学家和哲学家。这罗列出来也是一个长长的清单，还有些不太知名的，比如《种群数量的时空动态——对温室白粉虱的系统探讨》的作者徐汝梅。可能没什么人知道他，但是我就是通过读他的这本书产生了1994年一年的种植计划。这是一个生物学家。去年卡塞尔文献展五十周年的活动，他们要求我递交讲话提纲、工作笔记。工作笔记我就选择了这个作品。这个生物学家思考问题的方式，给我启发。他研究昆虫，研究如何通过益虫来防治害虫。害虫有一个自己的生态系统，益虫也有一个，但它们又共享生态系统，那怎么能够通过控制温度和湿度让益虫生长得健壮，同时杀除害虫。这个本来就很有意思，但更有意思的是，在实践里，这个模型要与环境沟通，环境沟通的输入输出却不可控制，结果益虫和害虫的两个系统并置的时候，产生了一个多余系统，由益虫和害虫的粪便滋生了腐食性动物及其生态系统。你看，这就是意外。我现在的作品，戏剧、电影、绘画就得益于这样的思维方式。

而且，不是这些东西包围我的艺术，我的艺术就是这些东西的直接表面。艺术必须无原则地创造出所有人能识别的那个东西，可以有连续性，拒绝任何带有特殊性的普遍性。这是当代艺术的一个基本原则。但现在有多少艺术是建立在这样一个基础上的？我们都是靠各式各样的特殊性来保护它。一张画好，就已经证明我已经知道了这个普遍性的东西，而且它可传递，虽然我不认识这个艺术家。但当他的老师、熟人、批评家、策展人不停地讲，这是在毁掉这个艺术。我们一直不尊重艺术本身。我们认为，只有艺术是为艺术而奋斗的，但艺术从来就没有作为一个主体存在过，从社会这个虚构体上面削下的小渣滓就可以砸死艺术，艺术就这么脆弱。“社会”常常被当作一个大棒抡向艺术，我们常常会说，这个艺术没有反映社会，你的艺术里我们看不到社会，就像说你是嫖客一样，一种话语。

艾：您也做策展。艺术家做策展与策展人做策展会有什么不同？

汪：这个问题我没有具体梳理过。具体到我做策展，2005年，我在上海的工地上做过一个叫“间隔”的展览。我把建筑师和艺术家强制性地放到同样一个空间，我接受任何一个结果。这个过程中，艺术家有的成为了彼此的朋友，有的成为了“敌人”后，又成为朋友。但对所有人来说，这种体会都是终身难忘的，因为他们以前没有这么做过。当时，在中戏做舞美的张慧与深圳的建筑师余佳在一起工作，在一个完成了整体结构浇筑、没有内装修的楼盘空间里。对于一个空间作为舞台和将要成为展示空间的功能是什么，两个人不停商量，最后产生了他们的空间形态。何岸和王晖合作。王晖把他的工作叫做“一毫米”，用一毫米的钢丝在这个空间里，建成了一个很复杂的结构；何岸去广西租了7亿只蚂蚁，他认为蚂蚁就是一毫米，他把它们放在这个空间里。我只举这两个例子。他们都创造了一个他们各自的知识都没有办法独立达成的效果，这就是一加一大于二。我当时策展的时候，思考的问题和我自己做作品的时候一样，就是我认为，如果你的起点是在已知里突围的话，那么你对已知的怀疑最终如何呈现？还有，行动最终是一个什么形式？

汪建伟 “时间寺”展览现场 综合媒介 尺寸可变 2014年Exhibition scene of Wang Jianwei, Time Temple, mixed media, variable size, 2004

The audience can be called a “society.” The only moment I can accept the concept of the audience is when it consists of individuals with differences. Then, if we maintain coexisting individual differences, isn’t that truest? It explains why I don’t care about the audience—I am defending what’s the truest in the group. Therefore my logic is this: I’m different from the audience, I defend my being different from it; and I don’t start from myself to imagine him to be the same as me. As for my artwork, many complain to me: “Mr. Wang, we can’t understand.” In fact that’s because I’m precisely defending the differences between you and me.

Ai: Apart from Borges, any other favorite writers you have?

Wang: Franz Kafka. I had a very long list of my favorite writers, sometimes giving their books’ names. So far many of them have been crossed out from the list. But Kafka is still more to my liking than anyone else. HisThe Castleis my best love. There is Albert Camus, whoseThe Strangerhad a great infuence on my writing, though I wouldn’t mention other things about him. Finally, Manuel Puig, whoseKiss of the Spider Womanimpressed me most.

Ai: You mentioned you dreamed to be a writer. Then who exerted more infuence upon you, writers or artists?

Wang: Scientists and philosophers, in the last decade. That would be another long list. Some of them are not so well-known, say, Mr. Xu Rumei, author ofSpatio Temporal Dynamics of Population Abundance: a Systems Approach to Greenhouse Whiteflies.Probably no one hears of him, but that book helped me work out my planting plan for 1994. He’s a biologist. Last year, to celebrate the fftieth anniversary of Kassel Documenta, they asked me to submit my speech outline and work notes. I included that book in my work notes. The way this biologist thinks is quite inspiring. He studied insects to fnd solutions against pests through beneficial insects. Pests have their own ecosystems. So do beneficial insects. However, they share an ecosystem. Then how can we keep beneficial insects growing up healthily by controlling temperature and humidity, and kill pests at the same time? Isn’t it fun! But more fun is this: in practice, this model has to communicate with the environment, whose input and output, however, are uncontrollable. In consequence, after the systems of beneficial insects and pests were juxtaposed, a redundant system emerged, an ecosystem of corrupt animals living on their droppings. You see, this is an accidental event. My present works—drama, flm, painting— beneft from this way of thinking.

Moreover, it is not that these things besiege my art, but that my art indicates a direct surface above them. Art must, regardless of principles, create something that everyone can recognize, something that can be continuous and reject any universality with particularity. This is a basic principle in contemporary art. But today, how many of artworks are built on such a basis? We all tend to rely on a variety of particularities to protect them. If I fnd a piece of drawing very fne, that proves that I’ve already understood something universal in it, which is transferrable, though I don’t know the artist (its author) himself. However, when the artist’s teachers, acquaintances, critics, curators all join the discussion of it, they are ruining the artwork. We’ve never paid due respect to art itself. We believe that nothing but art itself strives for a better future for art. However, art has never existed as a subject. To tell the truth, it is so vulnerable that any tiny dregs cut off from “society”—this made-up object— can smash art to death. “Society” is often taken as a ruthless stick to attack art. When we say: “This art doesn’t refect society,” or “We see no society in your art,” it’s simply like saying: “You’re a whorehouse visitor.” The same discourse.

Ai: You’re a curator, too. Any difference when you organize an exhibition as an artist?

Wang: Never gave it a careful thought. But I’ll tell you my experience as a curator. In 2005, I launched an exhibition “Partition”on a Shanghai construction. I “forced” architects and artists to share a space, and was ready to accept any outcome of their work. In the process, some artists made friends with each other; others became “enemies”frst, then friends fnally. For all of them, however, this experience was unforgettable all their life, because they had never done so before. At that time, Ms. Zhang Hui, a stage artist from the Central Academy of Drama, cooperated with the architect Yu Jia from Shenzhen city. They were in a building space without interior decoration where the pouring work of the overall structure had been completed. They continually discussed how to position the functions of the space as a stage and an exhibition ground, and fnally produced their space formation. Another cooperation example was Wang Hui and He An. Wang called his work “one millimeter,” and finished a complex structure with one-millimeter steel wires. He An rented 700 million ants from Guangxi province, who believed that those ants were one-millimeter in size, and left them crawling within their space. So much for the examples. They all brought forward results that couldn’t have been accomplished with their respective intellectual effort alone. This is just like one plus one is greater than two. When I was working as a curator, I would ask myself the same questions as I did with drawing: if you start from the known to fght your way out, how would you eventually present your distrust of the known? The last but not the least, what will be the form of the action in the end?

汪建伟 “黄灯”第二章节《“我们知道我们在做什么……”》展览现场（装置作品边沁之圆） 综合媒介 尺寸可变2011 年Wang Jianwei, Chapter II “We Know What We Are Doing…” exhibition scene (Bentham circle of installation work), “Yellow Lamp,”mixed media, variable size, 2011

艾：那您是引导艺术家这么做？

汪：不，我只是建立起这样的一个时间经验。就像这次我的个展，四点钟开幕，我把它叫“有人在后院排练”，名字和现实一样，我们就是四点钟在后院开始排练。有点像是“排演”这个概念，参加的人，我们以前也有过交谈、合作，不在一个完全互相不知道的情况下，但我们又没有排练过，我们不知道这十个人在一起会有什么出现。有策展人、批评家、艺术家、表演者、建筑师，最终我还请了牧师。牧师来之前，我也没有告诉他我要问什么问题。我在现场问牧师一个关于“复活”的问题，是我最近从哲学读物里读到的。我认为有两个重要的层面，第一，它是非生物意义上的死亡，所以从这个意义讲，它就是“生”。第二，它从来没有说过是个女人的死，还是男人的死，是以色列人死，还是巴勒斯坦人死；它是人的死，所以这里建立了另外一个纬度，就是“普遍性”。鲁明军马上就说：“尼采有著名的‘上帝已死’，牧师，我不是想冒犯你，但你作为牧师怎么看？”牧师回答说：“我确实听见很多人说，上帝死了，但我现在还不能确实告诉你上帝是不是死了，但我确实地告诉你，尼采是死了。”排练居然是这么开始的。我又问演员：“你们是不是每一次做戏剧的时候都要排练，排练是怎么进行的？”演员就过来说：“不一定，我们今天就可以告诉你，我们三个可以朗读我们最喜欢的文本，我们从来没排练过，没有排练是因为，要让你上演的戏剧才要排练，上演的戏剧一般都是制片人精心定制的，它会有票房，我们喜欢的如果不在这个系统里，永远不会有上演的机会，但我们确实喜欢，我们今天想读一下这个东西。”我的逻辑是，每个人觉得自己说完了就可以走了，我最先说完，我就走了。离开不用作任何解释，不用鞠躬，因为你们没有在表演。最后，空间负责人宣布后院的排练已经结束了，谢谢大家。没有掌声。大家就说：“啊，就完了啊？”因为没有表演，所以没有掌声，没有“观众”。我们跟他们在同样的时间里分享一些东西。

Ai: Did you lead the artists in the process?

Wang: No, I just created such a time experience. Like my recent solo exhibition. It opened at four o’clock. I called it “Some Are Rehearsing in the Backyard.” As the name suggested, we indeed began our rehearsal at four there. Kind of “semi-staging.” Participants were my acquaintances, with whom I’d had talks or cooperation. They were not completely strange to each other. However, we hadn’t rehearsed together before. Nor did we know what would happen to the ten participants, including curators, critics, artists, performers, architects. I, too, managed to invite a priest. On the scene I asked him a surprise question about“resurrection,” which I got from a philosophy reading. To understand this, I think there are two important levels. First, it’s no biological death; so it’s “birth” in this sense. Second, it has never specifically referred to a woman’s death, a man’s death, Israelites’ death, or Palestinians’death. Therefore, another dimension is involved—“universality.” Lu Mingjun got in immediately: “Priest, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche has a famous saying that ‘God is dead.’ Excuse me, I’m not offending you, but what’s your opinion?” The priest replied: “I did hear a lot of people say that God is dead. Now, I can’t definitely tell you if God is dead. But I can defnitely tell you that Nietzsche is dead.” With this, our rehearsal began! I asked the actors: “Do you rehearse every time you give performance? How does the rehearsal go on?” They came over and said: “Not necessarily. Today, we can tell you we three can read our favorite text. We’ve never rehearsed that, because a play needs a rehearsal only when it’s going to be put on, which, usually, is carefully customized by the producer, and aims at a box offce. If our favorite text is not included within this system, it’ll never be staged. However, we really love it, and we want to read it today.” My logic is that if anyone present feels that he can leave now, he can. So, I was the frst to have fnished, then I went away straight. No explanation, no bowing. No need for that, because you aren’t on the stage. Finally, the manager responsible for the space announced: “The rehearsal in the backyard is over. Thank you all!” No applause. Everyone else said: “Oh! Finished?” No applause, no “audience,” because there was no performance. We were just sharing something with them within the same time.

艾：也没有导演。

汪：没有啊。所以这就是你问的，我做展览跟策展人有什么区别。我觉得，展览“间隔”和作品《有人在后院排练》的逻辑是一样的。我理解的所谓的策展人的工作，就是组织，提供展示可能性的一个系统。但我的这个“可能性”与我的工作室工作的起点是一样的，是对“已知的匮乏”的行动，你的质疑如何展示出来。我做导演也好，艺术家也好，策展人也好，我没有变换生态，没有变换工作方法。

艾：您从成都到上海。哪个城市对您影响更大？

汪：我不去理解我居住的地方，不去理解“城市”后面的事情。

艾：我是关心作品产生的一个环境语境。

汪：我用“环境”这个词，不用“城市”这个词。有大环境和小环境，这是我可以思考的，但城市作为一个概念，我不思考这个词汇所对应的东西。我的理由很简单，第一，这个城市怎么命名？比如北京，我跟北京有多大的关系？最近三年，我甚至没有去过长安街，我知道的几乎就只是家、工作室、朝阳区、798等，偶尔到更远的地方，你让我谈城市，我就突然发觉我跟这个城市的关系非常局部。但这个局部可以代表这个城市吗？我很怀疑。既然不能代表这个城市，那我就不敢说，我的这个局部就是这个城市。第二，你在朝阳区望京，这个环境给你产生了什么样的关联？这个可以说。但是望京跟北京什么关系，可能就是未知的。有些位置是跟你没有关系的。如果说，你作为个中国人，你怎么想，这事儿就很荒谬，那你必须给“中国人”写一个定义。如果没有这个定义，这个问题也就不存在。

艾：你在追求一种普遍性的东西。

汪：我在德国、美国，我在任何一个地方，跟我在中国做展览没有特殊性。我每次都在纠正特殊性。比如说，有人问我“中国当代艺术”，我会非常直接地告诉他：“这不是我在思考的问题，但我也不会干预你们去思考这个问题，但你也不要要求我。”还有很多工作是我不做的。既然我怀疑特殊性，那我也不会以反对它而去获利。我不去批判特殊性，只是我不做特殊性的工作。所以这就是“环境的多”，这个概念非常重要。我不会批评“环境的多”。特殊性本身是环境中存在的，有相当一部分是以此为生的，它有悖于我的工作。但是，我把它放进“环境的多”去思考的时候，它就具有了正当性。

Ai: No director, either.

Wang: No. So, just now I’ve answered your question: what is the difference between my work as a curator and as an artist. For me, the logic behind my exhibition “Partition” and that behind the workSome Are Rehearsing in the Backyardare the same. As I understand it, a curator is an organizer, a provider of a system exhibiting possibilities. Nonetheless, the “possibilities” here and the starting point of my studio work are the same, equally an action against the deficiency in “the known.” A presentation of your distrust. To sum up, I’ve never changed my ecology or my working way, no matter whether I serve as a director, an artist, or a curator.

Ai: You moved from Chengdu to Shanghai. Which city has had a greater impact on you?

Wang: I’d not try to understand my living places, or something behind “a city.”

Ai: I’m being concerned about the environmental context in which artwork emerges.

Wang: I prefer the word “environment” to “city.” Macro or micro environment, yes, I may consider them. However, when “city” is taken as a concept, I never consider its equivalent. My reasons are simple. First, how do you defne “city”? Take Beijing as an example. How much do I have to do with Beijing on earth? In the last three years, I’ve even never been to Chang’an Street, the most famous of its kind locally. My whereabouts are almost just my home, studio, Chaoyang District, 798 ArtDist, occasionally somewhere farther away. So, if you catch me to talk about the “city,” all of sudden I fnd myself very, very “local” in this city. However, can this locality represent the city? Very doubtful, I should say. Therefore, I’m reluctant to mark this city with this locality. Second, if you’re in the Wangjing area, Chaoyang District, what association will this environment conjure up? This you can give your opinion. But what’s the relationship between Wangjing and Beijing? It may be unknown. Some locations are not related to you. Just like asking: “What do you think of it as a Chinese?” How ridiculous! You have to give a defnition to “Chinese” frst. Otherwise, this question cannot stand at all.

Ai: You’re pursuing something universal.

Wang: No particularity, whether I conduct an exhibition in Germany, USA, or any other place. I’m always correcting particularity. For example, if someone asks me about “contemporary Chinese art”, I will tell him bluntly: “This is not a question I’m thinking about. But I won’t interfere with you to do so. Conversely, please don’t require me to do so, either.” There’s a lot of other work that I won’t touch. Since I distrust particularity, of course I won’t proft from going against it. I won’t criticize particularity, simply because I don’t do any particular work. So this is “environmental diversity,” a very important concept. I won’t criticize “environmental diversity.” Particularity itself exists in the environment, much of which lives on it. Although particularity runs against my work, it becomes justifable when I take it into “environmental diversity” in thinking.

汪建伟 “时间寺”戏剧部分《螺旋坡道图书馆》第二阶段Wang Jianwei, Stage 2, The Library on a Spiral Ramp, theater part of Time Temple

艾：听起来很复杂。

汪：其实你把我说的话，直接从字面上理解就好。我行文一直很少用定语，因为定语太多对主语伤害更大。比如我说“艺术”的时候，是不加定语的。没有什么“中国当代艺术”“当代艺术”“年轻艺术家”“老年艺术家”“资深艺术家”“杰出艺术家”。这样就可以把历史对你的投射、语义学后面的东西变得很干净。

艾：排除掉？

汪：不，排除不了，但变得很简单。把定语去掉后，“艺术”后面的投射就少多了。前面定语越多，自由度越小。说穿了，自由真正就在这儿。其实艺术就是践行自由的一个场所。所以，我不接受任何一个对艺术下指标、指令的任务书。这就是我认为的自由，同时也是我的政治态度。

Ai: Sounds so complicated.

Wang: In fact it’s all right if you understand what I say literally. I seldom use attributives. The more you use them, the more they will harm the subject. For example, when I mention “art”, no attributive comes before it. Nor I say “contemporary Chinese art,” “contemporary art,”“young artists,” “old artists,” “senior artists,” “distinguished artists,” and the like. By doing so, you remove away those projections that history has offered, and semantic associations as well. .

Ai: Root them out?

Wang: No, no way. But much more simplifed. With attributives cut off, the projections behind “art” are much fewer. The more attributives, the less freedom. After all, this is right where freedom is. In fact, art is where you exercise your right to freedom! Therefore, I won’t accept any task imposed on me in the name of art. This is the freedom in my eyes, and my political attitude as well.

艾 姝：天津美术学院学报编辑

岳中生：中国民航大学副教授

Ai Shu: Editor of Journal of Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts

Yue Zhongsheng: Associate professor at Civil Aviation University of China

“Art Is Where You Exercise Your Right to Freedom” : An Interview with Wang Jianwei

Conducted and organized by Ai Shu, translated by Yue Zhongsheng