The dying of intangible cultural heritage
Text/Fu Wenjun
"Afterglow No.1" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow Around No.2" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.3" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow Around No.4" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
The category of intangible cultural heritage has always been one of the subjects of artistic creation, and I have always had a strong interest in ethnic, folklore and traditional crafts. It is the foundation of national culture, especially in today's increasingly globalized and informatized world, many intangible cultures are on the verge of being forgotten or even disappearing. At the time of the death of such a cultural legacy, I am always thinking about how to cross this death.
In the creation of "Aftersound", I connect the "literary style" that is disappearing, has disappeared, or may face disappearance, with the "fossil" that exists in the form of an immaterial site, and the "Shabu" as a handicraft that is about to disappear. I recorded stills of Western ballets, operas, and symphonies, such as Puppet Opera, Kunqu Opera, Suzhou Pingtan, shadow puppetry, etc., with a camera, and then presented these images on top of fossil pictures, that is, the process of juxtaposition of physical objects - flat records - multi-layered flat records.
"Aftersound No.5" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.6" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.7" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.8" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
Among them, I treat the stills on the fossils as a negative engraving effect, which can also be seen as a traditional silhouette or shadow puppet play. Because these art disciplines themselves have strong national characteristics. This treatment of the picture is, on the one hand, to present the record of the state of cultural relics in a more special way, and on the other hand, to explore the possibility of photographic presentation, so as to produce the effect of comprehensive materials.
The protection of intangible cultural heritage is a worldwide issue, and it is also our responsibility and obligation as practitioners of culture and art. For the civilizations that have disappeared, such as the Mayan culture, the Atlantean culture, the ancient Babylonian culture, etc., most of which are known to posterity, are derived from written records and descriptions.
Almost all public outreach relies on written language, radio and television. And I just want to visualize these Mayan cultures that could become the future of history through visual language—that is, dramatic moments. So I processed the picture as a projection of a mixture of materials permeated with historical changes and the vicissitudes of the past.
"Afterglow Around No.9" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.10" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.11" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.12" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
With the great prosperity of economy and science and technology, the culture belonging to the human spiritual level is becoming more and more popular, and the boundary between high culture and popular culture, pure literature and folk literature is becoming more and more blurred. In particular, the invasion of culture by commerce makes culture itself a commodity, an object of consumption and play.
In this context, those artistic styles that survive in the form of folk oral transmission and master-apprentice transmission cannot meet the aesthetic needs of modern people, and then move towards an increasingly marginalized and vulnerable position. In many folk arts, its aesthetic intention is mostly to cultivate the body and improve the soul, which runs counter to the fast-paced, multimedia and stimulating sense that modern society is keen on.
"Aftersound No.13" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.14" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.15" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.16" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
Out of humanistic concern, I had to throw myself into it; I had to make an appeal when confronted with the legacy of traditional culture; and in the process of modernization, I had to leave something for future generations so that they could have a "like" to find.
Of course, when it comes to the loss of cultural heritage, in addition to the influence of current consumption and commercial culture, it is also inseparable from the conflict between traditional culture and real life. These traditional artistic styles, whether Eastern or Western, contain the ideas, cultures, morals, customs and behaviors inherited from history, and of course, the aesthetic individual's outlook on life and values.
While we blindly pursue modernization, except for those art that can bring us fast-paced and consumptive like reinforced concrete and high-rise buildings, the traditional calm, obscure and pure art categories seem to have lost their independent existence.
"Afterglow No.17" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Afterglow No.18" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Aftersound No.19" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Aftersound No.20" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
Just like in addition to popular music, classical music and the poetry of various ethnic minorities seem to have lost their medicinal effect on the soothing of modern people's hearts. But humanity does not seem to have considered it, and this aesthetic arbitrariness has contributed to the disappearance of the value orientation of small communities. Over time, culture becomes scarce and monotonous. In other words, the production of consumer culture makes the deep mode and historical carrying of traditional culture dangerous. Neglecting the cultivation of culture for a long time is bound to cause more and more traditional literary and artistic forms to disappear.
Of course, I'm not against innovation and any commercial performances, I'm just coming up with the cultural attitude that an artist should have. Leave a little space for those traditional art categories. Have more time to re-understand traditional literary and artistic forms. Today's art is complex and messy, the loss of artistic idealism, and the powerful and impetuous system of interest operation have become difficult problems in the preservation of traditional art disciplines.
"Afterglow No.21" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Aftersound No.22" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Aftersound No.23" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
"Aftersound No.24" Fu Wenjun Digital Painting Photography 80x100cm 2014
What an individual artist can do is to pass it on and spread it as much as possible. Of course, it takes generations of efforts to pass it on. But the spread can stay in the present, and these calm and serious images of mine are a kind of record and dissemination. I hope that through my works, the audience can fully experience the cultural spirit, faith and emotion in these plays, ballets, symphonies and other arts. Although it can't be immediately visible, at least it can be lingering...