TOPO-URBANISM
Curator Zhu Sha
2021
前言
文/朱砂
EXHIBITION FOREWORD
Text/Zhu Sha
城市和它的市民阶层所形成的公共空间有着天然的道德优势，相较而言，惬意的田园则象征着更古典的价值，保守、个人、似乎更加自由，却缺少了一些更广泛的关怀。在布尔什维克出现前的沙俄，充满了这样的庄园主，比起他们精神上所向往的法国人，他们并没有那种刚强的人格，那种果断、英勇、激昂的人道主义精神。
田园能赋予人什么呢？除了离群索居和自给自足之外，我们知道在生产力没有解决之前，牧歌般的生活约等于对劳动阶级的压迫。这个问题在一些地方更加严重，以至于推动了我们的世界变成了今天的样子。所以到我们这里就有了土地改革，有了公社、军垦、有了社会主义新农村。我们曾幻想把所有的乡村抹去，形成城市，因为城市象征着先进和富足，再把城市与城市相连，造就传说中的大都会。而就在我们目标明确，稳步递进的过程中，却没有诞生出那个意义上的市民阶层，不仅如此，市民群体还逐渐萌生出对旧日田园，对大自然怀古的情绪，伴随着强烈的个人主义。如果说曾今的上山下乡还具有某种奉献精神的话，那今天隐隐鼓吹的田园生活就是一种全然不同的感召，包含一种更复杂的情感。
面对乡野，意味着逃离城市，意味着对某种不理想的回应。在被技术和大规模流动主宰的世界里，我们永远都处在这样动态的过程之中。与此同时，我们还能对自身赋予一丝乡愁的意味，毕竟新中国之后，我们大多是从乡村移民到城市的后代。而自奥德修斯重返伊萨卡岛之后，我们已经无法从文学上给予故乡更多的帮助，只好追溯一种虚构的景观。《局部城市》正是这样的景观，展览是社会历史事件，同时也是其构建手段。我们面临的北沟村，是一条不到两公里的山间小道，常住人口不到四百人。有一间改造过后的瓦厂酒店，一家三卅精品民宿，和一间刚刚落成的美术馆。这里既不远离城市，但也不靠近乡村，既不是计划经济的实验田，也不是城市化过程中的结合部，是一种局部呈现城市特征的新样本，一定程度上反映了人们对城市生活的反思，却又不甘于乡村，于是就有了都市和田园这两种生活，与过去的经验互相渗透的结果。
基于这样的状况，在这样的美术馆里重新筑建壁垒无疑是愚蠢的。应该与观众，与当地的居民进行更具体和持续的交流，以期产生一种新型的展览，所创造的意义就可以超越形式上的奇观和单纯的节日化。我们期望这里能出现曾经的斯德哥尔摩文化中心，而不是马尔洛的文化之家，我们要让观众在美术馆里打乒乓球，作品可以在各处，而不是关在一间房里，可以漫山遍野。当然这也会带来新的问题：人们曾经是那样的警惕大众这个概念，认为大众文化是文化的一种堕落形式，那么今天是否还会认为，公共艺术是艺术的一种堕落形式。
当然，我也依旧相信艺术品只供观看不供思考。这个展览有着其自身本地化、自由又谦逊的目标，好让我们抛开昨日或明日的生活，关注在永恒的当下里。最后，像梭罗说的，让世界保存于荒野之中。
The public space created by cities and their bourgeois class has an inherent moral advantage. In contrast, the idyllic countryside symbolizes more classical values—conservative, personal, seemingly freer, but lacking a broader sense of care. Before the Bolsheviks, Tsarist Russia was full of such landowners. Compared to the French they admired, they lacked the strong character, decisiveness, bravery, and passionate humanitarian spirit.
What can the countryside offer? Apart from isolation and self-sufficiency, we know that before productivity was addressed, an Arcadian life equated to the oppression of the working class. This issue was more severe in some places, prompting the world to evolve into what we see today. This is why we had land reforms, communes, military colonization, and the socialist new rural areas. We once fantasized about erasing all villages to create cities, because cities symbolized progress and prosperity, and then connecting cities to create the legendary metropolis. However, even as we advanced steadily towards this goal, the expected bourgeois class did not emerge. On the contrary, the bourgeois group began to develop a nostalgic sentiment for the old countryside and nature, accompanied by a strong sense of individualism. If the past “Up to the Mountains, Down to the Countryside” movement had any sense of devotion, today’s quiet promotion of rural life calls for an entirely different kind of appeal, encompassing more complex emotions.
Facing the countryside means fleeing the city, representing a response to something unsatisfactory. In a world dominated by technology and large-scale mobility, we are always in this dynamic process. At the same time, we imbue ourselves with a sense of nostalgia for the countryside. After all, most of us, since the founding of New China, are descendants of rural migrants to the city. Since Odysseus returned to Ithaca, we have been unable to offer our homeland much literary aid, and thus we have to trace a fictional landscape. Partial City is such a landscape. The exhibition is both a social-historical event and a means of construction. The North Ditch Village we face is a small mountain path less than two kilometers long, with a population of fewer than 400 people. There is a transformed brick kiln hotel, a boutique guesthouse, and a newly completed art museum. Here, we are neither far from the city nor close to the countryside, neither a test field for planned economy nor an intersection in the process of urbanization. It is a new sample of partial urban characteristics, reflecting people’s reflections on urban life while unwilling to fully accept the countryside. Thus, urban and rural life merge, creating an outcome where past experiences permeate each other.
Given this situation, it would undoubtedly be foolish to re-establish barriers in such an art museum. There should be more specific and sustained communication with the audience and local residents, aiming to generate a new type of exhibition, where the meaning created can transcend formal spectacles and mere festive forms. We hope that here, we can recreate the former Stockholm Culture Center, not Marlò’s cultural home. We want the audience to play ping-pong in the museum, with works scattered everywhere, not confined to one room, but instead spread across the mountains and fields. Of course, this will also raise new issues: People were once so wary of the concept of the public, viewing mass culture as a degenerate form of art. So today, would they still think that public art is a degenerate form of art?
Of course, I still believe that artworks are for viewing, not for thinking. This exhibition has its own localized, free, and humble goals, hoping to help us shed the lives of yesterday or tomorrow and focus on the eternal present. Lastly, as Thoreau said, let the world be preserved in the wilderness.