Artist: Melanie Irwin

Title: Surface Tension  作品名称： 表面的张力

Material: Furniture borrowed from XLY MoMA, found objects, textiles, bamboo, pins, twine, chalk marker 

材质：许燎源美术馆家具，意外发现物件，纺织品，竹子，钉，绳带，粉笔马克笔

Size: Variable  尺寸：可变尺寸

Year: 2013   创作时间：2013

It was a great privilege to be part of A Half Scene organized by Australia China Art Foundation at XLY Museum of Modern Art, Chengdu, June 2013. The exhibition was curated by Wei Yan and included Chinese artists from the North Village Independent Workshop and five other Australian artists. I undertook a short residency sponsored by ACAF at the museum, during which time I installed my work in the gallery and prepared for my performance. The museum staff, along with Miss Milia Bi of ACAF, were welcoming and extremely supportive, helping me to source the specific materials that I needed to make my work (this included a visit to a local second-hand market with North Village artist Zhao Huan).

Chengdu is a sprawling, gritty place; however there are trees and gardens everywhere, even on the rooftops of high-rise buildings. The people are friendly and the spicy Sichuan food is delicious. Our sightseeing included a visit to the Giant Panda Breeding Sanctuary and Kuanxiangzi Alley, where we saw a traditional Sichuan face-changing performance.

I also visited the vast, brand-new Blue Roof Contemporary Art Museum and some artist studios in the Blue Roof complex. It was fascinating to observe the contexts in which local artists make their work. Artist Yang Mian accompanied us to the Museum of Contemporary Art, where we saw a group exhibition of Belgian artists, Wanderlust, curated by Hans Maria de Wolf and including work by Francis Alÿs, Marcel Broodthaers, Honoré ’O, Joëlle Tuerlinckx and Panamarenko.

A Half Scene was a fantastic opportunity for me to present my work in an international context and it was rewarding for me to realize the ways in which art can transcend language barriers. I really appreciate the support and sponsorship of ACAF to facilitate my participation in this exhibition with a production residency for my installation works.

能参加2013年6月由澳大利亚中国艺术基金会和成都许燎原美术馆举办的展览《1/2现场》是我莫大的荣幸。本次展览是由策展人魏言策划的，参展艺术家包括北村独立工场的艺术家们和五位澳大利亚的艺术家。在展览期间，我参加了由澳大利亚中国当代艺术基金会赞助的短期驻留项目——为《1/2现场》展览布展并为自己的行为艺术作品做准备。我的艺术创作得到了许燎原美术馆的工作人员们和ACAF毕昕小姐的关注和支持，非常感谢他们能为我的作品找到独特的材料，以至于我的作品能顺利完成。（其中特别感谢北村独立工厂的艺术家赵欢与我一同去当地的二手市场）

成都是一个多沙的城市，但是树木和花园无处不在，甚至出现在高层建筑的屋顶。成都人民非常的友好，同时川菜也非常好吃。在成都我参观了大熊猫繁殖保护区和宽窄巷子,看到了传统的四川变脸表演。

我还参观了蓝顶当代艺术博物馆和附近的一些艺术家工作室。我非常高兴能了解到当地艺术家的艺术生态。感谢艺术家杨勉陪同我们一同参观蓝顶当代艺术博物馆,在那里我们看到了艺术家群展——由比利时策展人汉斯·玛丽亚·德·沃尔夫策划，参展艺术家包括Francis Alÿs, Marcel Broodthaers、 Honoré ’O、Joëlle Tuerlinckx 和Panamarenko.

《1/2现场》给了我一个非常好的机会和平台来展现我的艺术作品。这对我来说是件非常有意义的事情，因为国际文化背景的展览使我能跨越语言的障碍。我真心的感谢ACAF为本次展览和短期驻地项目的的支持和赞助。

An Exquisite and Eloquent Auto-sadism
------Watching the first performance art by Australian artist Melanie Irwin in China

On June 7th 2013, “1/2 Scene” North Village Independent Workshop (NVIW) and Australian Artist Group Exhibition, which was held by ACAF opened at Xu Liaoyuan MoMA.

The opening ceremony was bustling with crowded and excitement. When I stepped into the second floor of the exhibition hall, I found that people were extremely quiet. Everyone was staring at a blonde and white lady (who was found to be Melanie later), who was showing movements look like ballet, exquisite, eloquent and leisure, and her calmness added up to the serenity of the show. Chengdu is the most renowned city for performance art in China. Audiences all realised that it was a performance art show and watched for minutes. As an artist who also creates performance art, I realised that I was experiencing an excellent performance art. I asked a few friends to watch it with me before long.

As one type of the visual art, performance art also needs certain extent of formation. Plenty of “Performance Arts” seem to be swift and crude. Compared with them, Melanie apparently prepared well, with black tight-fitting clothes, black elbow-protector, black shoes---matches with her slender figure. The black ground set her pink chalk marker and yellow ruler off, as well as many bundles of exquisite installation----“#” shaped cubic structure (consisting thin and wooden chopstick has two sharp tips and seems to be pricking), including a reel of thread thrown by her on the cold and stiff ground---They all manifested exquisite beauty. Later I read the brief introduction about this work. When Ms. Yashian Schauble, who is the founder and CEO of ACAF, invited me to write a related critics, I decided to express on the basis of an audience on live.

When talking about locality of performance art, all the elements provided by Melanie harmonized with the scene. Luckily, although there were only a few audiences, it catered for the simplicity she expected. Under this circumstance, Melanie initiates her performance: throwing a red reel of thread, making the mark at the landing spot, and then drawing the red straight line between different landing spots; Moreover, every time she throw away the reel, she would cut part of the red line, and tie up a “#” shaped structure to the body (Firstly legs, then spreading across the whole body). More structure added up on body, more closely should she bend to ground when she tried to draw the line---It appeared to be increasingly difficult, laborious and even torturing. It took a long time to conduct the performance, and Melanie behaved calm and reserved in the whole process, even when the body became uncomfortable due to the increasing structure, she kept enduring, like a nun who was immersed in certain lesson and auto-sadism.

I comment carefully on the work impressing me. On the artist talk happened on the day of exhibition, I express my instinctive feeling towards this work----The red reel of thread symbolize human desire (You could call it fervent dream, even our lives), every marking of the landing spot is like the phase named by Buddhist, it is also the destination human desire attempts to seek in the reality, attempt (although Melanie’s performance show intensive and serious control, but every landing spot steel includes uncertainty, concealing the meaning of “nihility”), while the consistent connecting lines mark the will that human hope to carry on living and doing, as well as “Sankhata” mentioned by Buddhist; However, the “row of desire” cut for the frivolous, pink and dreamy track will constrain and prick the author. The installation of body constantly binds and overlies, like prison oneself in a cocoon---The more track we attempt to add, the more torturing body becomes. Lao Zi said, “Acquiring or abandoning, which really makes sense? Body or money, which one is important?”

The work of Melanie has enlightened the world, especially contemporary people. How can human deal with its own desire and attempt? The place and time this performance art occurred, Cheng du was holding the world-class “wealth forum”, this should not be merely a coincidence; another work displaying at the second floor of the museum is not a coincidence either, namely the installation “8 minute 20 second” by Chengdu female artist Deng Xiao (there were plenty of gigantic white balloons in a glassed room, whose gas was charged by a huge cylinder), when Melanie conducted her performance silently, Deng Xiao’s installation made sound of explosion of balloons, whether it was a intensive warning: like earthquake, typhoon, tidal wave which are all warning given by the god to human----Every creature has a soul, and human is only one part of the nature, constraining desire and cherishing nature, or the end of the world is approaching?

The installation that was put in advance in Melanie’s performance scene---the white, abnormally shaped, quiet membrane, the line surrounded the ground was not pink but the white line-----whether it symbolize our departure or destination----whether it is heaven or nothingness?

Luo Zidan   Chengdu  12th.Jun.2013

一场精致而优雅的自虐
——观澳大利亚艺术家梅莱妮在中国第一个行为艺术

2013年6月7日，由澳大利亚中国当代艺术基金会ACAF参与主办的“1/2现场”北村独立工场和澳洲艺术家群体联展在中国成都的许燎源现代设计艺术博物馆开幕。

开幕式是热闹的，但当我踏入展厅二楼，发现这里的人群异常安静，大家围观着一个金发的白人女子（以后知其名“梅莱妮”），她在呈现着有点芭蕾舞似的动作，精致、优雅而舒缓，她的淡定给现场平添了几分宁静。成都是中国对行为艺术最为知晓的城市，观众都意识到这是一场行为艺术，看了几分钟，作为一个同样创作行为艺术的作者，我意识到正在遭遇一场出色的行为艺术，很快，我拉来几位朋友一起观看。

作为视觉艺术之一，行为艺术同样需要到位的形式感，不少“行为艺术”显得仓促、草率，相对此，梅莱妮明显是精心预备：黑色紧身服、黑色护肘、黑鞋——和她修长的身材搭配，粉红色的画笔、黄色的米尺被黑色地面衬托，还有若干绑扎精致的小装置——“＃”字型的立体框架（构成的细木棒两端尖锐、一种“扎人”的感觉），包括她在质感冷、硬的地面不断抛出的红色线团——都呈现出精致的美感．．．．．．以后我读到关于这件作品的简述，写得较学术，当澳大利亚中国当代艺术基金会的董亚仙女士邀我写一篇相关评论文章，我想还是立足一个现场观者的直感来表达。

如果谈及行为艺术的在地性，梅莱妮提供的所有元素（包括其本人）与现场十分相融，幸运的还有：有观众，但不多，这也照顾了她所期望的某种简约，此氛围中，梅莱妮开始了行为：抛出一个红色线团，在落点做出标记，然后在不同落点的标记之间依次用米尺标出粉红色的笔直连线；而且，每次抛出线团、她会从中剪下一段红线将一个“＃”字型的小框架绑扎在身上（最早是腿部、逐渐蔓延全身），当这种框架在身体不断的附加、增多，她的每一次连线行动因身体要贴近地面去完成——显得越来越困难、吃力、甚至痛苦。该行为实施时间较长，整个过程梅莱妮从容、内敛，即便后来因自身框架的不断增多导致身体不适、她始终隐忍着，仿佛一个潜心于某种功课、也有些自虐的修行者。

打动我的作品我会用心评价，展览当天的研讨会上我表达了对这件作品的直感——红色线团可以象征人的欲望（你也可以说是炽热的理想，甚至我们的生命），每次线团落点的标记如佛家说的“着相”，也是人类欲望企图在现实世界寻求的着落、企图（尽管梅莱妮的行为表现出高度严谨的把控力，但每次抛出的落点仍具有不确定性，这里隐藏“虚无”的涵义），而不断的连线标示出人类在生存、行事——希望延续下去的愿望，也关连佛家所言“有为法”；而为了那些轻薄、粉红色、梦幻般的印迹，被剪下的“欲望之绳”（剪下的红线也可象征生命之一段）将限制、刺痛作者身体的装置不断捆绑、叠加，可谓作茧自缚——图谋的印迹越多、身体越难受。老子这样说：“名与身孰亲？身与货孰多？”

梅莱妮这件作品具有警世意义，尤其当下，人类该如何处置自身的欲望与图谋？该行为艺术发生的当地、当时，成都正在召开世界级的“财富论坛”，这不应该仅仅是巧合；另一件发生在博物馆二楼的作品也不仅仅是巧合——那就是成都女性艺术家邓筱的装置“8分20秒”（在一个玻璃房间悬置若干巨大的白色气球，有庞大的气瓶给它们充气），在梅莱妮静静演绎行为的过程中，邓筱的装置会定时传来气球刺耳的爆裂声，这是否是某种强烈的警示：就象地震、飓风、海啸等灾难都是上天给人类的警示——万物有灵，人类只是自然的一个部分，克制欲望，爱护自然，否者末世真的就要来临？
梅莱妮行为现场提前放置的装置——那些白色、异型、安静的膜，围绕在地面的不是粉红、而是白色的线条——所指是我们的出发还是归宿——是天堂、还是虚无？

罗子丹 于成都 2013．6．12