内容提要

序一 诗意与禅境—白明艺术的东方表情 一 喜欢白明的瓷艺； 喜欢白明的油画； 喜欢白明的水墨； 喜欢白明的综合材料； 喜欢白明的具象与抽象； 喜欢他的文字，他的思考，他的微博乃至他的生活方式。 世间才子多，才女也多。或因名不符实而遭人贬损，或因人云亦云而流于浅俗，或因自展开

序一 诗意与禅境—白明艺术的东方表情 一 喜欢白明的瓷艺； 喜欢白明的油画； 喜欢白明的水墨； 喜欢白明的综合材料； 喜欢白明的具象与抽象； 喜欢他的文字，他的思考，他的微博乃至他的生活方式。 世间才子多，才女也多。或因名不符实而遭人贬损，或因人云亦云而流于浅俗，或因自大狂妄而沦为孤岛，或因不思进取而落魄江湖。 白明，目光炯炯，天庭油亮，唇如激丹，齿若齐贝。在日行中天的年轮，却还像孩子那样好奇，像年轻人那样改变，像中年人那样思考，像老年人那样睿智。他在和大家一样的平庸岁月里，让视觉、听觉、触觉、嗅觉、味觉全部处于亢奋状态，于寂静中长长地寻觅通感，寻找着自己既熟悉又陌生的那种怦然心动。 于是，材与不材，鸣与不鸣，其间之度，如人饮水，冷暖自知；于是，白明和他的作品，无论是江南丝竹般的温润，还是黄钟大吕般的交响，均能传达出清静优雅的文人格调，折射出唐诗宋词般的古典情怀。 古韵中有新风吹拂，新风中有古韵弹拨。 于是，欣赏白明，需要有诗情的澎湃和禅者的静穆。 二 10年前出版的《时间的声音》，很能说明白明对诗意与禅境的孜孜以求。 时空概念，是人的哲学尺度乃至宗教尺度。 “时间更是世界上最具力量的一种物质，它的意志不容违背，它创造一切也毁灭一切。日月星辰、宇宙万物都在时间的作用下，无声无息地发生着变化。人的生与死、喜怒哀乐、得失荣辱无不在时间概念的转换下拥有不同的内涵。甚至连时间本身的概念在不同的时间里也有不同的解释。时间是宇宙中最伟大的抽象艺术家，也是最伟大的音乐家，它将整个世界都置于一种环环相扣、相互依存的和谐之中，人类及与人类相关的一切，都是时间笔下的一个个不断变化着的色彩和音符。” 在这种观念的烛照下，一系列艺术作品在白明的窑火之中炼就： 《思辨•形式》（综合材料）、《探究•虚实之间》、《探究•轻重之间》、《探究•方正之间》，而对这样的标题和作品，一般人很难进入理性判断。但在视觉的本能反应中，我们一想起罗丹那座著名的《思想者》，就会不知不觉地导入一个沉静而又冷峻的世界。道的幻化、佛的虚无、儒的发问，都在这脑电图般的作品中了。 《物语•另一种对应》、《物语•时间的声音》，则是哲学的追问，是存在对虚无的追问，是对生命质感的追问。 《瓷语新解》系列、《探究•远近之间》、《苇风吟》、《春之舞》等，我们可以看出一个文化人、一个陶艺家对当下生存环境的思考，可以感受到另外一种社会形态存在的意义。 最让我动容的是《古城窟》系列、《山水与时间》系列。这类作品很容易让人想起一句话：生命之全体即为艺术之自身。容易让人想起岁月的刻刀，想起沧海桑田、白驹过隙，容易让人陡生浩叹与无奈。 白明并不是一位虔诚的禅宗信仰者，但他一直有意识地将自己置身于一切因禅而产生的文化实践中。 《参禅•形式与过程》也罢，《大成若缺》系列、《大汉考•龟板》系列也罢，我都看成是白明禅悟的结果，形式、过程都来源于“天生夙慧”。因为这些都不是白明修来的，而是上苍赐予的，真个是若将耳听终难会，眼处闻声方得知。未入禅门而得禅，并非来自刻意，而是一种发自生命本体的价值观与审美观的喷发。 语言是存在陷阱的。一般艺术家关注笔墨语言、材料语言、形式语言，却常常将语言本体（我说的语言本体，就是文字语言，在这里可以理解为文字的书面语言）丢失。这就常常不自觉地自残而不自知。白明不会，我们从他上述作品的名称中，能深深体悟到他的良苦用心。这一条其实已经让他和不会伺候语言本体的艺术家的距离拉得很大。 三 不能不单独说一下白明的青花。 元朝在中国封建社会中，算得上是短命的王朝之一。又由于完全靠武力征服，把人分四等，南方的汉人最下等，类似猪狗，因此往往为宋以降的汉族知识分子所不齿。 但元朝在文化上曾经开出过一朵奇葩：元青花。 白釉，青花。发色苍郁，造型雄浑，画法写实，用笔挺健。中国瓷器的恒定之美终于找到了感觉。 《蒙古秘史•总泽•卷一》记载：苍狼白鹿相配，方有蒙古人。苍为蓝。蓝天白云中的蓝与白，在瓷器上定格。 青花瓷，由于能够在白瓷上尽情挥洒蓝色色调，故得到上至庙堂下及江湖的一致喝彩。青花的诱人之美，骨子里是表达了自然中最坦荡的无碍与洁净。 “白明青花器物的造型，在单纯中不乏精致，且巧、且美。他运用点、线、面的结合，充分表现形的变化和瓷器质材的品格。即便那些不引起人们注意的细节之处，如沿口、底部、盖钮等等，无一不体现出匠心，显示出讲究、精细、含蓄、沉着、稳妥、挺拔的美感，蕴含着优雅和柔刚相结合的传统文化气质。”美术史学家奚静之先生如是说。 我看白明的青花，一是用料配方作了改进，烧成发色后蓝得更为纯正，色彩更加柔和清淡，元青花的凝重古雅、苍雄沉郁之气几乎找不到踪迹。二是装饰图案虽然仍以植物纹为主，但完全远离了元青花的“满密平”布局，也与伊斯兰图案艺术彻底分道扬镳，非常智慧地保留了多直线、曲线相互交叉、重复组合的几何型。三是器型的变化。白明对器型非常挑剔，他的办法是从传统的器型库里，挑出多款公认的经典器型，天天看，时刻琢磨，直到在心里把这个器型看走了样，看出了感情，再将心中的尺码去实践中伸长、缩短，几十次、几百次地试。他多姿的梅瓶、雍华的玉壶春瓶、胖胖的笔筒、圆圆的茶罐，无不带有鲜明的白氏风格。四是画风的变化。元青花画风，保存着磁州窑釉下黑彩粗犷豪放的风韵，用笔生动有力。而白明把生动有力保留，让细腻高雅去取代粗犷豪放。 白明谙熟传统技法，在此基础上大胆变革，让他的青花瓷具有鲜明的现代审美意趣。他既远离国画的简单移植，又远离传统装饰的图案化，器物上似草、似花、似果、似荷塘、似芦苇、似流水的种种意象，给人明丽、开朗、生机蓬勃的艺术感受。这让他与景德镇所有创作模式大相径庭。我大胆地认为，古老的青花瓷只有到了白明这里，才算走到了当代。 我写了几句夸赞白氏青花瓷的话发在微博上，兹录如下： 霓裳羽衣飘在天际，秦砖汉瓦藏在心底。昌江水，高岭泥，拈花一笑，窑火穿烟雨。翩翩少年，穿越青花地，素墙黛瓦，帆影千万里。 面对着青花瓷，面对着白明的青花瓷，面对着由整体的结构、肌理、色泽来雕成的东方文化表情，面对优雅内敛的仪态，面对高品位的格调，我们除了感动和柔软，除了敬慕和赞叹，还容得下丝毫的造次与亵渎么？ 四 抽象能否艺术地表达东方表情？回答是肯定的。 抽象一般与写意为伍，因为抽象与写意都在企图说明感觉，而感觉恰恰是艺术之魅的根本。一般而言，抽象比写意走得更远。 抽象一般为两种，一种是由激情所主宰的抽象，一种是有所控制的抽象。 白明的作品（除前期的具象外）显然是一种有所控制的抽象。尽管仍然觉得他还是由自己的感觉所主宰，让我们看不到什么明确的“意义”，但从线、点、色块、材料等等细节，完全可读出细腻、玲珑、婉转、轻盈、别致和飘逸。正是这些点、线编织的艺术流图案，为他的作品添加了诗意。 点、线和色块，一直都是作为美术创作工具来使用的，陶瓷从用泥到烧成，也要经历无数工艺流程，而到了白明这里，点、线、色块都成了表现的对象。这一点，虽然西方艺术家使用过，也介绍到了国内，但遗憾的是，恰恰没有引起陶瓷艺术界的重视。还好，在陶瓷艺术界，幸亏有个白明。 在白明的作品面前伫立、凝视，你会觉得这些色彩单纯、线条简洁的构图，有时是装饰效果，都会渐渐远去，而一种内在的宁静和自信却离你越来越近。 白明对他作品中所显现出来的“东方气息”从不怀疑。越是到西方世界去游历、展出、讲学、交流，他越是感到中国文化的博大精深。他对中国传统文化的喜爱，对中国古典音乐的偏爱，加上常年的品茗、趺坐，使他创作的任何作品都深深地打上了自己的烙印。 白明的瓷上植物世界，是一个自主的世界，也是一个纯粹的世界。以他的代表作之一《生生不息》来分析，这里没有树，没有鸟，没有土壤，我们不知道这是一种什么样的藤蔓。它密密匝匝，占据着画面的所有疆域，甚至没有给画面留下多少空白。我们只看到了青花线条的缠绕，只看到了生命的交织，只看到了激情的涌动。这时，植物不是植物，藤蔓不是藤蔓。它既不作为他者的背景，也不需要他者来做自己的背景。它在排斥现实世界的同时，也排斥了一个粗鄙的想象世界。 是的，终极艺术，就是要创造人类前所未见的世界。白明在这样探索的时候，没有忘记节奏、韵律，没有忘记色彩的搭配，由此，诗意与禅境于有意无意间生成。 如果林风眠先生介入陶瓷，还只是简单地以画入瓷，或借瓷绘入画，相互借鉴，那么，白明算是艺术家中非常深入的一个。看白明瓷艺的美器美绘，真的是若吮三千年洁冰，沁人心脾，那份形质清澈、手感温润，那种蓝白的对比与变化的神完气足，那种火凤凰涅槃于烈火的高贵，让人久久不能释怀。 五 有人认为心的最高境界，是丰富的单纯。就是心的核心部分始终是单纯的，却又能包容丰富的情感、体验和思想。 天才艺术家的使命，就在于为自己内在的精神世界寻找最恰当的表达方式，创造出真正具有人文含义的抽象形式。 白明的微博，恰恰为我们洞开了他的内心世界。 下面，从他的几千条微博里摘上十余条，让大家看看斯人的所思所想： （一）论艺术 现代艺术对我们的贡献，不仅是停留在视觉里和艺术史里，现代艺术其实是可供快速浏览的简明思想史。 敏感的艺术家对材料的表情和语言，有着独特的感悟。有时是艺术家发现了材料的情感和美，更多情况下，是材料引发了艺术家的灵感和创造力，此时的材料，在作品和艺术家眼里，已经是艺术的先知。 艺术风格不完全是依着美术史，也不是仅仅依着思考而诞生的。艺术风格是从自身的情感、修养、审美和品质中发芽并生长出来的。 艺术和文化不是靠产量，不是靠规模，不是靠人海战术，不是靠政府提倡，不是靠会议讨论，不是靠评奖评家，不是靠相互吹捧，不是靠利益捆绑，更不是靠与名家与官员的合影。这样做了一遍或几遍以后，抛弃了文化艺术的灵魂，谀官、谀商的庸俗文化得以大繁荣。 （二）讲修心 学会每天拿出点时间来安静地观察自己，会给我们带来莫大的好处。自身，是部独有且无法外借的厚厚的书。许多人每天都在读书，花时间和精力去印证他人的思想，却很少翻阅自己这本每日不同的鲜活的书。自身，是我们感知生命最真切的母体。 心有万千感受，人有万千情态，目有万千发现。关键看我们怎样使用。 能体会出平凡生活中每一天的不同，对我们来说，这一天才显出了真正的意义。 （三）谈游历 在巴黎。白天，河边沙滩上度假；夜晚，酒店灯下读书。女儿在用电脑放歌听，先是王菲的《传奇》，再是阿黛尔的《转辗于深渊》。真好听，一个是银色的丝绸，靓而幽；一个米黄色的亚麻，温而朴。 在新墨西哥博物馆，安静地听印第安著名音乐家的箫声。那音乐里独有旷野中深沉的孤独，及轻描淡写的悠扬，满溢着对自然的爱。听着，心底软着，眼眶湿着。 美国的酒店离店时不查房，我原以为是个别现象，现在看来不是。这样做的好处不仅可以让顾客减少等待时间，而且显出了信任，尊重了人。 （四）聊生活 昨日回国为的是今日的中秋。中国人何等浪漫，竟发明了“中秋”这样一个美好且具有诗意的节日。由祭月到赏月的转变，是人性温暖的一次提升。我们享受着祖先的文化柔爱，在每次的欢度中滋生着对自然的敬意，感受着人间的温暖。 人类的沟通是何等的不容易和不平等，以为有了共同语言就知道了彼此的诉求，以为我们的真实诉求会让倾听者感同身受，以为现代一定会给落后民族带来幸福，以为讲民主的国家一定是以民主起家。“沟通”前面是“沟”，“通”的前提是平等。这个世界充斥着平等的假象，让“沟通”无法通畅。 我几十年喜欢浅色的衣着，喜欢丝绸，喜欢青花，喜欢水晶，喜欢老物件，喜欢似琥珀的茶汤和黄酒，尤其喜欢看干净的眼神。朋友说这是“洁癖”，患这种“病”的人在今天做艺术家不合时宜。这不合时宜倒是常有领教，但历史已经不能改了。 微博是当代的一种自媒体，许多人开微博是凑热闹、弄围观，白明却认为微博让自我倾诉成为可能。这也是他与别人不一样的地方。微博是有字数限制的，但科技的发展让一些特别有智慧的人，将这一平台打造成自己的“红粉知己”。 微博上的种种感悟，说出来也就三言两语，但一旦我们真的走进去，细细琢磨，那里却是春色满园，姹紫嫣红一片。 六 一个人的生命，既有显性的存在，也有隐性的存在。在一部分人眼中，他是显性的；在另一部分人眼中，他又是隐性的。每个人，包括名人，概莫能外。 2011年秋，应白明的朋友坚邀，我们一行来到了大才子李渔的家乡—浙江兰溪。 这是白明显性存在的一次铁证。 当地的贤达和乡绅穿着礼服，驾着高级轿车，白明风度翩翩地被接到高速公路出口处的收费处，由数名女青年献花。 开放市内最好的景观、景点，下午亮灯、喷泉。游艇破例开动，鸣笛致意。 将“芥子园”开放，并摆上美味佳肴，专门安排一场歌舞、朗诵晚会。晚会又登上城中高地，饱览兰溪夜景。 不为高官，不为厚禄，不为投资，不为扬名。兰溪人是懂得价值判断的，他们为一个艺术家，一个他们心仪的艺术家，可以这样付出，可以这般排场。 那个晚上，白明当然地喝醉了，我也当然地失眠了。 我想起李渔曾在芥子园的那座山上，建过一座亭子，名字就叫“且停亭”，上书一联曰：名乎利乎道路奔波休碌碌，来者往者溪山清静且停停。 为什么不“停”一下呢？有得必有所失，有舍方有所取。 昔日李渔没有去摘那顶乌纱帽，让我们这个世上多了一位戏曲家、旅行家、出版家，有了《芥子园画传》；今朝白明没有去拼什么博士、教授，我们不是已经多了白氏杯、白氏青花和《景德镇传统制瓷工艺》吗？ 月到天心处，风来水面时。一般清意味，料得少人知。 李渔和白明，都为我们建了一座又一座“且停亭”。人在旅途，目的就是赶路，但有亭子，进去歇歇脚，把气喘吁吁将息得心平如镜总是可以的。 如此想来，这辈子做白明真好，做白明那样的艺术家，真好。 最后还想说的是，倘若一个生命不能饱满地呈现于外，那么就不可避免地存在着误读。 有关艺术的问题是，拿艺术家所用的语言来说，它牵涉到所有毫无艺术准备的人。他们无法理解某个艺术家想告知人们的某种艺术语言。这时，艺术语言的翻译者就出现了，如我即是。当然，想要达到一种“高保真”境界，还是得付出理解的成本和时间的代价，而后可以期待回收：东方的诗意与禅境。 （作者系江西美术出版社社长兼总编辑） PREFACE 1 Poetic and Zenic: An Oriental Sentiment in Bai Ming’s Art Part 1 I like Bai Ming’s ceramic art; I like Bai Ming’s oil paintings; I like Bai Ming’s ink paintings; I like Bai Ming’s comprehensive materials; I like Bai Ming’s concreteness and abstractness; I like his writings, his thoughts, his micro-blog and even his lifestyle. Talented men, and women, abound in this world. Some are derogated because they’re unworthy of their name; some are superficial because they follow the herd without thinking; some feel lonely because they are self-important and arrogant; and some fall down and out because they lack enterprising spirit. Bai Ming — a man with piercing eyes, glossy forehead, red lips and white teeth —while in the middle of his life, he remains as curious as a child, as changeable as a young man, as thoughtful as a middle-aged man and as sagacious as an old man. Like us, he lives in a mediocre era, yet he is able to keep five senses — vision, hearing, touch, smell and taste, all in an activated state. He has long groped in the quiet dark seeking for synaesthesia, an experience of something in a different way, and looking forward to a feeling of excitement which is both familiar and strange to him. Thus, it doesn’t matter whether he is talented or untalented, whether he is succcessful or unsuccessful, just like we drink water and it doesn’t matter whether it is cold or hot. Bai Ming and his works, whether they are soft and warm like stringed music or clear and resonant like symphonic music, can convey the elegant style of the literati and reflect the classical feelings of Tang and Song poems. Ancient classics are stirred by fresh elements, and fresh elements are immersed in ancient classics. And thus, we need to have a poetic sentiment and a Zenic peaceful state of mind when it comes to appreciating Bai Ming. Part 2 The Sound of Time, published ten years ago, can well account for Bai Ming’s assiduous seeking for poetic realm and Zenic acme. The concepts of time and space are human’s philosophical dimension as well as religious dimension. “Time is the most powerful substance in the world, and its willpower allows no violation. It creates everything and destroys everything. And everything in the universe, including the sun, the moon and the stars, are quietly changing under the impact of time. Human’s life and death, happiness and sorrows, gain and loss, honor and disgrace,all have different connotations with the change of time. Even time itself has different interpretations in different periods of time. Time is the greatest abstract artist and the greatest musician in the universe. It places the whole world in an interlinked and interdependent harmonious situation. Humankind and everything related to humankind are constantly changing colors and musical notes with the passage of time.” It is guided by such ideas that Bai Ming has created and tempered his works of art. Ordinary people find it difficult to give a rational judgment when confronting with such titles of the following works: Thinking and Analyzing in Form (comprehensive material), Exploring the False and the Real, Exploring the Light and the Heavy, and Exploring the Foursquare and the Upright. Yet, in our visual instinct, a mere thought of the famous Thinker by Rodin will lead us into a quiet and cold world before we realize it. The Taoist hallucination, the Buddhist nothingness and the Confucianist inquiry — all are reflected in these works of art, just like electroencephalograms. In his works of art Speech of Objects•Another Counterpart, and Speech of Objects•The Sound of Time, it is a kind of philosophical inquiry, inquiry about existence and nothingness, and inquiry about the essence of life. From New Interpretations of Ceramics Series, Exploring the Far and the Near, Reeds in the Wind, and The Dance of Spring, etc, we can see how a ceramic artist or a man of letters thinks about survival in the current situation and feel the meaning of another form of social existence. What touches me most are Kilns in Ancient Town Series and Landscape and Time Series. These works remind us that life in entirety is art in itself. Also, they remind us of the vicissitudes of life and the quick passage of time, throwing us into a deep sigh and a state of helplessness. Bai Ming is not a devout Zen Buddhist, yet he has always immersed himself consciously in the cultural practice of Zen Buddhism. Whether it is Practising Meditation•Form and Process, or Defects in Perfection Series, or Studies of the Han Dynasty•Tortoise Plastron Series — all of them, in my view, come out of Bai Ming’s realization to truth by practising Zenic meditation. Both the form and the process originate in his “innate wisdom”, not attained through self-cultivation, but granted by God. It is difficult to make such an attainment merely by listening; seeing is equally important. Though not a Zen Buddhist, he awakens to the truth of Buddhism. This does not come from his earnest effort, but a spontaneous overflow of his values and aesthetics in the noumenon of life. Language has pitfalls. Normally, artists pay attention to language in pen and ink, language in material and language in form, yet they often neglect language itself (by language in itself, I mean language in written form, or written language). Oftentimes, this leads to unconscious self-mutilation. Bai Ming is not such an artist. From the titles of his above works, we can acquire a deep understanding of his care and thought. This, indeed, has kept him quite a distance from those artists who do not care about language itself. Part 3 I have to spare a special page for Bai Ming’s blue-and-white porcelain. The Yuan Dynasty is one of the short-lived feudal dynasties in China. Because of the conquest all by force and the division of people into four ranks, with the Han people of the south at the lowest rank, being treated like pigs and dogs, the Han intellectuals who had just been transformed from the Song Dynasty despised the Yuan Dynasty. However, in terms of culture, the Yuan Dynasty contributed an outstanding work: the Yuan blue-and-white porcelain. White glaze and blue-and-white porcelain are presented with blue colors, forceful carvings, bold and vigorous brushwork, and a realist style. And from them, we can feel the constant beauty of Chinese porcelain. According to The Secret History of Mongolia, Vol. I, the Mongolian people originate in the copulation of a blue wolf and a white deer. Blue and white correspond respectively to the blue sky and the white cloud, and they are freeze-framed in porcelain. Because blue hue could be sprinkled wantonly on a white porcelain, blue-and-white porcelain got unanimously acclaimed by both imperial court and general public. Its tempting beauty shows the purest and noblest side of nature. “Bai Ming’s blue-and-white devices are both simple and exquisite in shape. By using dots, lines and surfaces, he gives a full display of the changes in shape and the quality of porcelain materials. Even those small details, such as edges, bottoms and lids or buttons, all embody ingenuity, show a particular, meticulous, implicit, composed, steady forceful beauty, and contain an elegant temperament of the traditional culture,” art historian Mr. Xi Jingzhi said. In my view, Bai Ming, firstly, improves his formula of materials in his blue-and-white porcelain paintings, making the blue hue more pure blue and the colors more soft and light. Thus, we see almost no traces of graveness, elegance and gloominess in the Yuan blue-and-white porcelain. Secondly, though the decorative patterns are still mostly the veins of plants, they are completely away from the “full-dense-flat” layout of the Yuan blue-and-white porcelain, and also totally different from the patterns of Islamic art; they very wisely retain a geometrical shape, with multiple straight lines and curved lines crisscrossing and combining repetitively. Thirdly,the shape of devices have changed. Bai Ming is very meticulous about devices. He selects a number of well-accepted classical devices from among the traditional devices, staring at them every day and turning them over in his mind time and again until he sees them out of shape and takes a liking for them, and then, he tries lengthening or shortening them dozens and hundreds of times in the practice by using his own criterion. Graceful plum vases, dignified jade flasks, fat pen containers and round tea canisters, all of them have a distinctive style of his own. And the fourth is the change of the painting style. The painting style of the Yuan blue-and-white porcelain is characterized by rough and unrestrained use of colors, and vivid and forceful brushwork. Bai Ming retains the vivid and forceful style, and replaces roughness and unrestraint with delicacy and elegance. Bai Ming is well-versed in traditional techniques, and on this basis he innovates boldly, making his blue-and-white porcelain a distinctive taste of modern aesthetics. He does not simply transplant the traditional Chinese paintings, nor adopts the traditional decorative patterns. The various images on his devices, which look like grasses, flowers, fruits, lotus leaves, reeds or running water, bring people a bright, open-minded and vigorous artistic feeling. This makes him largely different from the creative models of Jingdezhen. I am bold to say that it is owing to Bai Ming that the age-old blue-and-white porcelain can find an echo in the present-day society. I have written a few verses in praise of Bai Ming’s blue-and-white porcelain and released them on my micro-blog, which are as follows: Beautiful clothes fluttering on the horizon, Antique stuff hidden in the heart. Water in the river, mud on the mountain, Picking up a flower and smiling, With kiln fire glowing in misty rain. A handsome young man, traversing a blue-and-white land, a plain wall and dark-blue tiles, And a boat sailing far away. In the face of the blue-and-white porcelain, in the face of Bai Ming’s blue-and-white porcelain, in the face of the carvings of Oriental culture with an integral structure, texture and lustre, in the face of the elegant and restrained deportment, and in the face of the high-quality style, we cannot but admire and feel excited. How dare we allow any slightest imprudence and blaspheme? Part 4 Can abstraction be used to express the Oriental sentiments artistically? The answer is “yes”. Abstraction often comes together with freehand brushwork, because both try to account for feelings, and feelings are essential to art. Generally speaking, abstraction goes farther than freehand brushwork. Abstraction normally falls into two categories: one is dominated by passion, and the other is more or less controlled. Bai Ming’s works (except for his earlier figurative works) are obviously a kind of controlled abstraction. We find that he is still dominated by his own feelings and we do not see any definite “meanings”, yet from some particulars such as lines, dots, color lumps and materials, we can completely sense his delicacy, exquisiteness, mildness, lightness, uniqueness and gracefulness. It is the artistic patterns woven from these dots and lines that add a poetic flavor to his paintings. Dots, lines and color lumps have always been used as tools of artistic creation. The making of porcelain, from mud to baking, requires a series of technological processes, yet for Bai Ming, dots, lines and color lumps have become his expressive objects. This technique has been used by Western artists and has been introduced into China long ago. Unfortunately, however, it has not aroused attraction in the circles of ceramic art. And fortunately, there is a ceramic artist named Bai Ming. Standing and staring at Bai Ming’s works, you will find the composition of these pure-colored and simple-lined paintings might be a decorative effect and will fade out gradually, and yet, an intrinsic serenity and confidence will come to you nearer and nearer. Bai Ming never doubts the “Oriental sentiment” embodied in his works. The more he travels, displays, teaches and exchanges in the Western world, the more he feels the extensiveness and profoundness of Chinese culture. His love for traditional Chinese culture, his preference for Chinese classical music, plus his regular drinking of tea and sitting in meditation, makes his works all stamped with the brand of his own style. Bai Ming’s botanical world on the porcelain is a self-determined world as well as a pure world. Take one of his masterpieces, Life in Endless Succession, for example. Here, there are no trees, no birds and no soil; we do not know what kind of vines they are. They are densely distributed, occupying all the places and leaving little space in the tableau. What we can see is only the crisscrossing of blue-and-white lines, the intertwining of life and the surging of passion. At such a moment, a plant is not a plant, and a vine not a vine. It does not serve as the background of others, nor does it need others to act as its own background. While it rejects the real world, it also rejects a sordid imaginary world. Yes, ultimate art! It wants to create a world we have never seen before. In exploring it, Bai Ming does not forget rhythm and rhyme, and not forget the matching of colors, thus arising the poetic sentiment and Zenic conception, consciously and unconsciously. Suppose that Mr. Lin Fengmian involved himself in ceramics, what he would do is simply to paint on porcelain or to use porcelain as painting material, drawing on the experiences of both. Bai Ming, however, can be counted as a very penetrating artist. Looking at Bai Ming’s wonderful ceramic art, we have a refreshing feeling. The clean and clear chinaware, the soft and warm touch on it, the contrast of blue and white, the various changes, the nobleness of pheonix Nirvana... all remain long and fresh in our mind. Part 5 Some people think that the highest state of mind is abundant in simplicity, that is, the core part of mind is always simple, but it contains abundant feelings, experiences and thoughts. The mission for a gifted artist is to find the most proper way of expression for his own inner spiritual world and create a truly humanistic form of abstraction. Bai Ming’s micro-blog exactly opens up his inner spiritual world for us. Next, let us pick a dozen pieces from thousands of remarks in his micro-blog to show what he thinks in his mind... 1. On art Modern art’s contributions to us are not merely found in our visual sense and art history. Modern art, in effect, is a brief history of thought that we can browse quickly. A sensitive artist has a unique perception for material’s expressions and language. In some cases, it is the artist who discovers material’s feelings and beauty. In more cases, it is material that touches off the artist’s inspiration and creativity, and at this moment, material has become a prophet of art in the eyes of the artist. An artistic style does not completely rely on art history, nor does it rely merely on thought for its birth. It germinates and grows out of the artist’s own emotions, self-cultivation, aesthetic appreciation and personality. Art and culture do not rely on output, not on scale, not on huge-crowd strategy, not on government advocacy, not on discussions at the meetings, not on awards and titles, not on mutual flatteries, not on bundled interests, not to speak of taking a group of photoes with distinguished artists or officials. If you have done such things once or several times, you have cast away the soul of cultural art. Then, the vulgar culture of flattering officials and merchants will run rampant. 2. On self-cultivation Learn to spend some time every day in observing yourself quietly, which will benefit you very much. Everyone is an exclusive thick book that cannot be borrowed. Many people read books every day, sparing time and energy to verify other people’s thoughts, but few people bother to read themselves, which are alive books that changes every day. Self is the truest matrix from which we can perceive life. A heart can have thousands of different feelings, a person can have thousands of modalities, and eyes can have thousands of discoveries. All depends on how we use it. If we can feel the differences of each day in our routine life, then it is a real meaningful day for us. 3. On travel In Paris, I spent my holidays on a river beach in the daytime and did some reading in my hotel room at night. My daughter was listening to some songs on the computer, first, the Legend by Wang Fei, and then, Rolling in the Deep by Adele. Very good songs: one is silvery silk, nice-looking and serene; and the other is beige flax, warm and plain. At a museum in New Mexico, I was listening quietly to bamboo flute music by a famous Indian musician. The music sounded like a special loneliness in the wilderness, a melodious tune of rise and fall, and a deep love for nature. While listening with my ears, I felt tender in my heart and wet in my eyes. In America, hotels do not check the room when the guest leaves. At first I thought it was an individual case, but now it seems not. In doing so, the waiting time is reduced for the hotel guests, and more importantly, it shows mutual trust and respect among people. 4. On life Yesterday I returned to China for the Mid-Autumn Festival which falls on this day. Chinese people are so romantic as to have invented “Mid-Autumn”— a nice and poetical festival. The shift from offering sacrifices to the moon to appreciating the moon is an upgrade of human warmth. We are enjoying the cultural tender love passed down from our ancestors, and every time in celebrating the festival, we increase our respect for nature and feel the warmth in this world. How difficult and unequal it is to communicate between human beings! Don’t believe that we know each other’s wishes if we use a common language. Don’t believe that our real wishes will be appreciated as a personal favor by listeners. Don’t believe that modernization will be sure to benefit the less developed nations. Don’t believe that a democratic country must have started with democracy. Equality should be a precondition for communication. False equality is found everywhere in this world, making “communication” impossible to go smoothly. For dozens of years I’ve been fond of light-colored clothes, silk, blue-and-white porcelain, crystal, old devices, amber-like tea soup and yellow rice wine, and in particular fond of “clean eyes”. My friends told me this is mysophobia, overly fastidious about cleanliness. A person with this “disease” is unfit to be an artist. I have experienced such misfit many times, but this old habit cannot be changed. Micro-blog is a kind of self-media in the present day. Many people open a micro-blog just for fun, for popularity. Yet, Bai Ming believes micro-blog makes it possible to pour out one’s innermost feelings. This is another aspect he differs himself from others. Micro-blog limits the number of words, but technological progress enables some smart people to build this platform of communication into their “bosom friend”. The varied thoughts and comments on micro-blog are fragmentary pieces. However, once we actually step in and ponder over them, we’ll find it is a spring garden filled with varied colors of flowers. Part 6 A man’s life exists both visibly and invisibly. For some people, he is visible, and for others, he is invisible. This is true to everybody, including prominent people, without exception. In the autumn of 2011, upon invitation from Bai Ming’s friend, we arrived at Lanxi, Zhejiang Province, the hometown of the great gifted scholar Li Yu. This is hard evidence for Bai Ming’s visible existence. Some local prominent personages dressed themselves neatly and drove their limousine cars to the toll gate of the expressway to meet us, with a few young girls presenting bouquets. The most beautiful scenic spots in the town were open to us. A yacht sailed out of the dockyard, blowing its whistle to salute us. Jie Zi Yuan (the Mustard Seed Garden) was open, delicious food was laid at table, and a song-dance-recitation gala party was specially held for us. After the party, we stepped onto a highland to appreciate the night scene of Lanxi. Not seeking for high office and great remuneration, and not for money and fame, the Lanxi people know how to judge values. They could contribute so much and go in for such grandiose for an artist, an artist they admire in their heart. That night, Bai Ming certainly was drunken, and I certainly sleepless. I remembered Li Yu building a pavilion at the hilltop in the Mustard Seed Garden and he named it “Stopover Pavilion”, with a couplet inscribed on it: Fame and money make people busy on the go all the time, People coming and going should stop over at the hill brook for a quiet while. Why not “stop” for a while? Where there is gain, there is loss; where there is abandonment, there is obtainment. In the past, Li Yu didn’t enter into politics, so there is one more dramatist, traveller and publisher in this world, and there is the book Jieziyuan HuaZhuan (Manual Painting of the Mustard Seed Garden). Today, Bai Ming does not strive for doctorate and professorship, but he contributes to us the Bai’s mugs, Bai’s blue-and-white porcelain, and The Traditional Crafts of Porcelain Making in JingDeZhen City. The moon rises in the sky, The wind blows on water surface. Few people are supposed to know, The implied meaning of quietness. Li Yu and Bai Ming both have built a “Stopover Pavilion” for us. Travelling on the road, a man has to hurry on with his journey. Yet, there is a pavilion ahead. Why not take a rest there and calm yourself down? Thus, it is nice to live like Bai Ming, and it is nice to become an artist like Bai Ming. One more thing, if a life cannot be fully displayed to the public, then there must be misunderstanding and misinterpretation. About art, in terms of artists’ language, it involves all people who are not artistically prepared. They cannot understand a particular artistic language that an artist wants to speak. Thus, interpreters of artistic language emerge. I am such an interpreter. Certainly, to reach a “hi-fi” realm, it takes more time and needs more understanding, and by then, we’ll be able to feel the poetic sentiment and Zenic conception in the Orient. （Writer is the president of Jiangxi Fine Arts Publishing House and editor－in－chief） 序 二 心灵的桃花源—白明的艺术 台湾在商业挂帅政策下，随着经济活动的活跃与商业领域的拓展，都市的疆域不断侵吞边缘田地，在水泥丛林中生活日久，很多人都遗忘了曾经存在的草原、池塘、大片稻绿及上面流动的清新空气。整个社会垃圾信息太多，政治强烈对立，人文精神似乎越来越淡薄了。台湾在这种大环境下，因其接受大陆母体文化的传承，同时受到西班牙、荷兰及日本殖民文化入侵和美国强权文化的植入，很多艺术家竟然以守护传统文人水墨为己任，强调渡海三家(溥心畬、张大千、黄君璧)的纯正道统，讲究用笔用墨、水墨晕染、布局设色及气氛之营造，一切以前辈或大师为典范，彻底模仿，不敢有任何逾越，越接近乃师，越自以为得意。西画方面大部分学院出身的画家，是留日前辈画家的日系画家传人或少部分杭州艺专的学生，笔触、用色、构图、肌理的堆积均类似日本老师或学自百年前欧洲的类印象派画风；有部分自国外学成归国，却完全移植欧美各种当代绘画风格，却因不了解本国文化，空有西方新奇风格的空洞形式而已。只有少数的台湾艺术家自觉西方艺术理念不可取代本地文化，必须活化，必须起死回生，因此，努力深入了解传统，再摘取适合自己的本土元素，试图使材料、技法、精神在传统理念的审美上加以提升，让创作既有个人风格又有东方内涵及当代精神。如刘国松“革书法线条的命”，弃画笔而用非笔墨之技法，创造出西方艺术家无法画出的东方现代抽象山水。他别具用心地找到一种手工制造的纸，以画纸面密布的粗细纸筋抽离纸上墨渍，产生一种新的皴法。新思潮、新材料、新工具共同造就新的画风。他是20世纪60年代台湾现代绘画开拓者“五月画会”的会员。另外，萧勤则以纯粹的粗笔线条、温润的色彩在大量留白的空间营造出充满线条律动之美与空间的有机对应，充分发挥道家“大道无形”、“气冲太虚”之美。萧勤是20世纪60年代台湾现代绘画另一领航画会“东方画会”的成员。刘国松、萧勤不像传统水墨画家或印象派画家，后两类循规蹈矩依照前人或师长指示路线前进，花了大半辈子时光，怎么走都在老师后面。尤其是传统水墨，前面路上排满了大师身影。赵无极在自传中说：“中国画在16世纪后就丧失了创作力，以后的画家不过是抄袭汉唐的伟大传统，中国画成了一套笔墨技法，不再有想象力与个人创意空间。”他又说：“我不复制大自然，并避免陷入技巧的圆熟和重复。”吴冠中说：“我在传统中得益的是启发，在传统中受害的是模仿。”刘国松、萧勤还有赵无极、吴冠中都在告诉我们传统里有宝藏，也有更多僵死的糟粕，或过时的、不合时宜的杂物。所以好的艺术家要能深入了解传统，能从传统残骸中删繁就简，汲取精华，创新是从，挣脱传统空壳，汲取传统养分而成长壮大。 我们所了解的白明，即是一位对中国传统文化有着深刻的体会，并把对西方抽象艺术的了解与中国文人审美情怀融进了创作的全方位艺术家。他做陶瓷、雕塑、画画，策展、听音乐、喝茶、坐禅；时而做陶瓷，时而画画或雕塑，最近又开始画水墨，都有很好的成绩。原因在于他除了对大中华文化有深刻的体会认识外，日常生活品位即离不开琴棋书画茶等精神生活。他每件作品都来自亲身体会，感知材料特性美感，凡事亲力而为；最重要的是，他浸淫在大中华文物的高雅、宁静、单纯、简朴的情怀中，维持清明的知觉、敏锐的直觉和自信并长期坚持下来。他知道什么是他要的，什么要舍弃；如艺界禅行者，尽量抖落材料、色彩、形式等各种不必要的葛藤，追求单纯、清明、温润，甚至有些孤寂的审美观。就像鲁迅说的：“竭力将可有可无的字、句、段删除，毫不可惜”。 白明对材料及创作理论的洁癖是与禅宗的纯朴孤寂及极简主义(Minimum Art)的单纯、简约相通的。例如陶瓷，他以做洁净的白瓷为主，釉色以青花为大宗，再搭配少量画龙点睛的釉里红。中国是世界陶艺的原乡，青花瓷更是名满天下。白明青花瓷的泥土是经过了仔细研究选料，找出软硬粗细合宜做陶泥的混合土；釉药也是以传统的釉料调合配比而成；釉之彩绘则是仔细把水墨线条经过3D思考后，以植物花卉用书法线条经过图案化与平面立体化构思后绘成的。这种“白氏”风格的青花瓷，温润细致而纯净，极富中国文化底蕴。看白氏瓷让我想起禅宗的诗：“始从芳草去，又逐落花回。”他的陶艺雕塑与装置，例如《古城窟系列》、《大汉考》、《过程》、《风水石》、《管锥篇》等系列，也是在极简中充满沉静却又富跃动的生命力。 就像白明的青花瓷，精简选择单一材料与表现手法，直击东方传统陶瓷文化最精彩的核心。他在绘画上也表达了对中国传统水墨道统的向往与尊敬，并融合了他对当代抽象绘画的深刻了解。而做陶瓷对他画抽象画有极大的助益。他既回避了大部分大陆艺术家必走的以写实基础（苏俄传入之社会写实主义）的具象绘画，又要坚持他对媚俗、小巧审美的反动，走向严肃、气派、庄重、正统的审美倾向；那么，他必须在想法、材料与色彩或技法上有所突破与创新。他在陶瓷的经营日久，对非绘画性肌理、质感、画面不同效果的经营与表达绝对比一般平面画家深厚许多。也因此，绘画上白明以独创性材质在画面上与色面、线条有机融合，塑造出异于西方油画肌理或从写实主义发展出来的新肌理、新思维、新材料组合产生出的新风格，那是象征的、隐喻的、温润的、低调的，而又耐人寻味的。他内心幽微的感受及文化素养就在这凹凸软硬中默默诉说着心中的“桃花源”。 白明在做瓷、画油画外也画大幅纸上水墨。从黑到白的“墨分五色”中，它用染、泼、洒、滴、画，甚至用火烧或茶渍染纸，在一片静寂中，充满了单纯笔墨游走之舒展，以无形蕴有形，尺幅内有无穷天地，既是画，也是视觉的诗。 自康定斯基到蒙德里安，他们把几千年具象绘画传统推向纯抽象的领域。康定斯基是感性与音乐性，蒙德里安则以造型为美的核心。他们把抽象绘画推离文学性、自然模仿性、说明性及故事性，而达到绘画元素组合的纯粹美的存在。在大陆，抽象绘画始终曲高和寡，属于小众的艺术。白明在绝大多数乡土写实、政治波普、玩世卡漫等具象绘画充斥之画坛中，坚持他的抽象风格，不学西洋人的舌，也不学自家人的舌，忠于自己的坚持。这条路是孤寂的，而且没有前例可循。不过，白明似乎胸有成竹，以沉静而自信的心态继续追寻他艺术的原乡—心灵的桃花源。 （作者系东方画会会员、亚洲国际美展会员，台湾著名画家、艺评家、雕塑家） PREFACE 2 Arcadia of the Soul Bai Ming’s Art Mercantile policy has a strong impact on Taiwan. With dynamic economic activities and commercial expansion, urban sprawl increasingly encroaches the suburban land. Having lived too long in the concrete jungle, many people forget the grassland, pond, paddy fields and the fresh air above. The whole society is conjested with too much junk information, torn apart by sharply divided politics, and the humanistic spirit seems to be fading out. In such a general situation, Taiwan accepts the traditional culture from mainland China, and meanwhile, it has been influenced by the colonial cultures from Spain, Holland and Japan, as well as the power culture from United States. Many artists still defend the traditional style of ink paintings and the pure orthodoxy of the three great masters migrating from mainland China (Pu Xinyu, Chang Dai-chien and Huang Junbi), emphasize the use of ink and brush, the layout of colors and the building of atmosphere, all modelling on forerunners or great masters, completely imitating, not daring to take a single step beyond them, and the closer their imitation is, the prouder they feel about themselves. In terms of Western paintings, most painters are descendants of elder painters who once studied in Japan or Europe, and a small number of painters graduate from the former School of Fine Arts in HangZhou. The brush strokes, the use of colors, the composition of pictures and the heaping of texture all resemble the styles of Japanese teachers or European quasi-impressionist painters. Some of them completed their studies abroad and returned, totally transplanting the modern styles of European and American paintings, but due to their lack of a deep understanding of Chinese culture, their paintings are nothing but an empty form of the Western new styles. Only a few Taiwanese artists find that the Western conceptions of art cannot replace the native culture, only that it must be activated and revitalized. Therefore, they think it is necessary to gain a deeper insight into the tradition, adopt some appropriate local elements, and try to enhance the traditional aesthetic appreciation in materials, techniques and spirits, making their artistic creations marked by Oriental connotations and contemporary spirits, along with a personal style. For instance, Liu Kuo-sung “revolutionizes the use of lines in paintings and calligraphy”. He does not use the painting brush; instead, he uses techniques without a brush to create modern-styled Oriental abstract paintings of mountains and waters that Western artists cannot do. He manages to find a kind of handmade paper and uses the thick and thin paper tendons densely covered on the paper to produce a new wrinkling method. In this way, new thoughts, new materials and new tools bring forth a new painting style. He is a member of the Painting Association of May, a pioneering assocaiton of modern paintings in Taiwan in the 1960s. Hsiao Chin, on the other hand, uses purely thick lines and mild colors to create a rhythmic beauty of lines on a vast blank space, giving a full display of the Taoist beauty of “invisible morality” and “vital energy”. Hsiao Chin is a member of the Oriental Painting Association, another leading assocaiton of modern paintings in Taiwan in the 1960s. Liu Kuo-sung and Hsiao Chin do not follow the traditional ink painters or the quasi-impressionist painters, who keep to the beaten track directed by predecessors or teachers. No matter how much time they spend or how hard they work, they always fall behind the great masters, particularly in the area of traditional ink paintings. In his autobiography, Zao Wou-Ki said, “Chinese paintings began to lose creativity in the 16th century, and painters of later generations were merely copying the great traditions of Han and Tang dynasties. Chinese paintings have degenerated into a craft of brushwork, without any more imagination and personal creative space”. He added, “I do not duplicate the nature. I try to avoid being lost in the proficiency and repetition of crafts.” Wu Guanzhong said, “What I benefit from the tradition is inspiration, and the harm is duplication.” Liu Kuo-sung and Hsiao Chin, as well as Zao Wou-Ki and Wu Guanzhong, all of them warn us that there are treasures deposited in the tradition, but there are more ossified drosses or outdated, inappropriate sundries. Therefore, a good artist should gain a deeper understanding of the tradition, cutting off the superfluous, drawing the quintessence from the traditional dregs, and making innovations. In other words, they should learn to grow in strength by taking in traditional nutrients. As far as we know, Bai Ming is such an all-dimensional artist who has a deep understanding of traditional Chinese culture and blends both the Western abstract art and the Chinese literati’s aesthetic sentiment into his creations. He makes porcelains, carves statues, draws pictures, plans exhibitions, listens to music, drinks tea and sits in meditation, and recently, he begins to draw ink paintings. He excels in all the areas because, apart from his deep understanding of traditional Chinese culture, his daily life is closely associated with painting, calligraphy, music, chess and tea. He does everything personally, and wants to have a personal aesthetic perception of materials for each piece of his work. Most importantly, he immerses himself in the elegant, peaceful, pure and plain sentiments of Chinese cultural relics, keeps a clear awareness, a keen instinct and a strong confidence, and he can keep on with them for a long time. He knows what he wants and what he should abandon. Like a Zenic Buddhist in the art world, he tries to shake off materials, colors, shapes and all the unnecessary things, but pursues a pure, bright, mild, and even somewhat lonely aesthetic standard, just as Lu Xun talked about writing: “try to delete those words, sentences and paragraphs that are not essential, without any regret.” Bai Ming’s strong preference for materials and creative theories is interlinked to Zenic simplicity and loneliness, as well as Minimum Art’s purity and simplicity. Take porcelain for example. He mainly makes clean porcelain, with the glazing color mostly blue-and-white, to go with a small amount of underglaze red. China is the original place of ceramic craft in the world, and the blue-and-white porcelain is world-famous. The clay that Bai Ming applies on his porcelain is carefully selected; it is a kind of composite clay mixed with crude, soft, hard, thick and thin mud. Also, glarizonae is composed of traditional glaze materials in proportion. The color decoration of glaze is done by using the calligraphic lines of plants and flowers as patterns after a careful three-dimensional study of the ink lines. Such a Bai’s style of blue-and-white porcelain is mild, pure and delicate, full of Chinese cultural elements. Staring at his porcelain, I remember a Zenic poem: “Grass is green when you go, Flower is fallen when you come back.” His ceramic sculptures and devices, for example, Kilns in Ancient Town series, Studies of the Han Dynasty, Process, Geomancy Stone, and Limited Views —— all of them are full of calmness and vitality in a minimum degree. Just like his blue-and-white porcelain, which chooses single materials and techniques of expression to strike straight at the core of the traditional Oriental ceramic culture, Bai Ming in his paintings also shows his yearn and respect for traditional Chinese ink paintings and mixes his deep understanding of contemporary abstract paintings. Making porcelian is very helpful to his drawing of abstract paintings. Now that he wants to avoid figurative paintings that most of mainland Chinese artists have to do based on realism (social realism introduced from Soviet Russia) and he wants to keep on with the serious, solemn and orthodox aesthetics instead of vulgar and petty aesthetics, so he must make some breakthroughs and innovations in ideas, materials, colors and techniques. He has been immersed in ceramic art, so he is absolutely superior to ordinary graphic painters in managing and expressing the different effects of texture, sense of reality and appearance of paintings, and so he is able to develop a new style different from Western oil paintings and social realist paintings by using his unique materials and mixing them with colors and lines on the frame of paintings, a new style which is symbolic, metaphoric, mild, low-profiled and thought-provoking. With his innermost feelings and artistic appreciation, he is silently narrating an “Arcadia” of his heart by means of these paintings which have a soft or hard bumpy surface. In addition to making porcelains and drawing oil paintings, Bai Ming also draws ink paintings on the broad-leaf paper. By using the “five colors of ink” (from black to white), he dyes, spills, splashes, drips and paints, and even dyes the paper with tea stains. Thus, in an atmosphere of silence, a single brush moves freely, visibly and invisibly, bringing forth a vast world within a small frame, which can be both a painting and a visual poem. Artists from Kandinski to Mondrian have pushed ahead the ancient tradition of concrete paintings to a purely abstract realm. Kandinski emphasizes sensibility and musicality, whereas Mondrian places tableau as the core of beauty. They strip abstract paintings off their literary features, natural imitation and narration, but try to pursue the existence of pure beauty. In mainland China, abstract art is art for a small number of people, too high-browed to be popular. While figurative paintings of native realism, political pope and cynic cartoonism run rampant in the art circle, Bai Ming sticks to his own abstract style, parroting neither Western paintings nor traditional Chinese paintings. It is a lonely path, without precedents. However, Bai Ming seems to have a well-thought-out plan, and with a calm and confident state of mind, continues to pursue the source of his art — Arcadia of the Soul. (The author is a famous painter, art critic and sculptor in Taiwan, a member of the Oriental Painting Association and a member of the Asia International Art Center) 序 三 白明多米尼克•巴达斯 每件艺术品，都密集着白明飘逸隽永和渊博才思的磁场，什么语言能够评论如此天物？ 雅，这种极至的雅，源自艺术家自身的“大儒”气质。 白明，其人如其作品，其作品犹如其人。 有的艺术家其人其作有其一致性，而有的艺术家其人其作之间却很相悖。而艺术家如白明，我们会情不自禁地追随他的目光，投向他创作所用的材质，看到作品一点点成形、凸显轮廓、画笔优雅地落在坯上，当艺术家和材质融为一体，飞旋流转之际，完美的传世之作已经问世。 白明是柔和的、恒久的。其作品的材质虽具备天生的脆弱性特质，他却赋予其独立不朽的灵魂，彰显出不可断灭的永恒。当代性的思想和最精华的传统精髓，使其作品在空间上具备无限的延伸性，具备穿越时空的能力，衔接了古往今来。 永恒…… 从白明的绘画作品中，我们可以看到其艺术创作的二元性。绘画源于艺术家心灵深处的创作需求和对不同材质的探索。油画、陶瓷绘画等艺术形式是源于艺术家深层次的精神需要，还是一种对于材质的无意识的情感诉求？又或者是他仅仅在种植自己的幸福感？！ 抽象，被理性化的抽象和理性的抽象！极柔，却极强大。虽然没有叛逆的艺术语言，我们却能完全感受到白明绘画作品中，如同青春期一般的强大的生命气息。白明所携的绘画和陶瓷，亮相于当代艺术的聚光灯下，所有材质的作品均摆脱了所有的符号体系，向观众传递艺术家的优秀！于是，自然而然，白明的艺术是当代艺术，更是未来的艺术。 白明其人其作，都极具魅力。他如今已有很大的影响力，随着岁月的流转，还将铸造不朽的辉煌。 最后，鄙人很荣幸地透露，我感到万分荣幸，因为我是作为他的朋友写下了这些文字。 （作者系瑞士日内瓦艺术之门基金会主席） PREFACE 3 BAI MINGDominique BATTAS How to describe the subtlety, sensitivity, scholarship, concentrated in a work such as that of Bai Ming? Refined, this refinement to the’great letters’that he himself! Bai Ming looks like his works and his works is in his image. Perhaps, this may seem paradoxical or obvious, according to the feeling that one has of the subject or the author, but when one knows the man, one cannot consider otherwise the look that it poses on the material, from the way he transformed the little recently, gives it its contours, its smooth forms, his brush that landed gently on the raw workand then by a hand as secure as the man himself, without arrogance, draws scrolis which gradually organize themselves in a perfect construction! Bai Ming is smooth, as read-only; its works; yet made fragile, seems indestructible it as evidence, intended to defy time, mixture of contemporaneity, and ancestral techniques, continuity in-space, pier gateway between generations past and present. Perpetual… Duality, with the pictorial work of Bai Ming, natural extension in the need of creation artist, mixed media, canvas and ceramic, not too away from its profound nature, or unconscious pursuit of the emotional connection to the material, cultivated with happiness! Abstraction reasoned and reasonable, sweet and powerful, speaking without revolt, but firmly, a is ‘Pubescent’, endearing, pursuing the same path of excellence that of ceramics, turned towards the light of the contemporary Creation, out of any constraint, detached from any symbolism, natural bridge, as a result, between “contemporary Art” and “Art of the future”… Bai Ming is an endearing character, his already masterly work is promised a bright future, because it will still grow, feeding experience and time passing. Finally, to conclude, I have a huge privilege, he told me I was ‘His friend’, but don’t repeat it to anyone!... Chairman of the Door of Art Foundation, Geneva, Switzerland 收起