2019.05.29

美国评价当代中国艺术的三大障碍 Three Obstacles in the Evaluation of Contemporary Chinese Art in the US.

魏立刚《万物》,知美术馆展览现场
魏立刚《万物》,知美术馆展览现场

祝贺魏立刚回顾展《万物》顺利开幕,暨知美术馆《开放的东方-国际亚洲美术馆馆长峰会》成功召开。在3画廊全文发表,美国丹佛,亚洲艺术协会主席Julie Segraves在峰会上的发言,如下。

 

Three Obstacles in the Evaluation of Contemporary Chinese Art in the US. 

美国评价当代中国艺术的三大障碍

Julie Segraves /史钰丽

Asian Art Coordinating Council Executive Director/亚洲艺术协会主席


 

Obstacle 1

Western trained contemporary art experts and critics and their control over the international assessment of contemporary Chinese art. 

障碍1:西方训练的当代艺术专家和评论家及他们对当代中国艺术国际评价的控制。

1- What would American trained Western art experts and critics think about an article written in 1950 by a Chinese art writer who traveled to the US to view and assess Jackson Pollock’s famous Drip painting series that had been featured in a 1949 issue of Life magazine? 

如果一位中国艺术作家到美国去观看和评估杰克逊·波洛克(Jackson Pollock)在 1949年《生活》杂志上发表的著名点滴画系列,在美国训练的西方艺术专家和评论 家对这位中国艺术作家在1950年写的一篇文章会有什么看法呢? 

2- This fictitious Chinese writer would be coming from the newly established People’s Republic of China, a country which valued Social Realist art and in the early 1950’s would use it to promote the new government’s political agenda. Let’s further assume that the Chinese writer had no other knowledge of US modern or contemporary art, Western art history or theory, and did not speak or read English. Would the Western art experts and critics deem his written perceptions of Pollock’s work accurate and interesting, or would they just dismiss his article as the opinions of a misguided and uniformed author, one who could not possibly understand the importance of Pollock and his art? 

假如这位虚构的中国作家来自新成立的中华人民共和国,一个提倡社会现实主义艺术的国家,在20世纪50年代初中国政府用这种艺术来推动新政府的政治议程。让我们进一步假设,这位中国作家对美国其它的现代或当代艺术、西方艺术史或理论全然不知,也不会说或看不懂英语,西方艺术专家和评论家会认为他写的对波洛克作品的看法是准确和有趣的吗?或许他们会把他的文章看作是一个被误导和无知的作家的观点,认为他不可能理解波洛克和其艺术的重要性的人。

3- I ask these questions because since 2000, along with the dramatic surge of popularity and market appeal of contemporary Chinese art, there has been a striking increase in the number of Western art experts and critics reviewing contemporary Chinese art exhibits inside and outside of China, acting as exhibit curators, and as “ art expert” consultants for newly founded galleries and museums in Asia. I think it is safe to say that the majority of these Western art experts and critics have not studied Chinese art, do not know Chinese art theory, are not familiar with contemporary life in China and the history of the country, and do not read or speak Chinese. Yet for the most part it has been these very Western art experts and critics who have defined what is considered innovative, experimental or globally relevant contemporary Chinese art, using their own very narrow Western art lens in which they have chosen to view and write about contemporary Chinese art. In turn, this group has often affected what US contemporary Western art curators choose to display and collect, the auction houses’ and galleries’ perception of what artists they should promote and sell, and have had an impact on what collectors have decided to purchase. 

我之所以问这些问题,是因为自2000年以来,随着中国当代艺术的人气和市场吸引力的急剧上升,西方艺术专家和评论家的数量显著增加,他们在中国国内外审查中国当代艺术展,担任展览策展人,并在亚洲新成立的画廊和艺术馆担任“艺术专家” 顾问。我认为我们可以肯定地说,这些西方艺术专家和评论家中的大多数都没有学习过中国艺术,不了解中国艺术理论,不熟悉中国当代生活和中国历史,不会读也不会说中文。然而,在很大程度上,正是这些非常西方的艺术专家和评论家,用他们自己非常狭隘的西方艺术视角来定义了被认为是创新的、实验性的或全球相关的当代中国艺术,他们选择了审阅和撰写当代中国艺术。为此,这一群体经常影响到美国当代西方艺术策展人选择展出和收藏的作品、拍卖行和画廊对应该推广和出售 哪些艺术家作品,并对收藏家决定购买什么作品产生影响。

4- The term ‘globalization’ is often bandied about by this group when discussing their preferred contemporary art, with little recognition or acknowledgement of China’s unique art history, which differs dramatically from that of the West. All too often Western art experts and critics have expressed little interest in Chinese artists using traditional Chinese art techniques and mediums, which they appear to not understand, and for the most part, relegate such art as not ‘global’ 

他们在讨论他们偏爱的当代艺术时经常引用“全球化”这一术语,很少认识到或承认与西方有着显著的不同的中国独特的艺术历史。西方艺术专家和评论家通常对使用中国传统艺术技术和媒介的中国艺术家不感兴趣,他们似乎不了解而且在很大程度 上将这些艺术贬为“非全球性”。 

5- The few exceptions include Abstract paintings by contemporary Chinese ink artists, and work by older Chinese artists, primarily from Hong Kong and Taiwan who traveled to the West during the 1950s-60s, and who were influenced by Western Abstract Expressionist art. What many Western art experts and critics often fail to realize or acknowledge is that both of these groups are also firmly indebted to historic Chinese ink art techniques and philosophies. 

当代中国水墨艺术家的抽象绘画,多数从香港和台湾在1950-60年代前往西方的中国老艺术家的作品,他们深受西方抽象表现主义艺术的影响, 属于少数例外。许多西方艺术专家和评论家往往没有意识到或认识到,这两个群体也深深地受惠于中国古代的水墨艺术技术和哲学。

6- The Western art experts and critics are particularly attracted to an array of what they consider Chinese avant-garde, experimental, global, or transforming art practices, all which have been inspired by, or originated in the West, rather than adjusting their perceptions and opinions by delving into China’s rich and complicated art history to actually understand and appreciate its impact on contemporary Chinese art and its practitioners. 

The question persists: Why should Western art experts and critics continue to claim cultural domination over what is considered innovative, experimental or globally relevant contemporary Chinese art? And how can it be stopped? 

西方的艺术专家和评论家们尤其被一系列他们认为是中国先锋派、实验派、全球性的或是转换艺术实践所吸引,这些艺术实践都是受西方启发或起源于西方,而不是通过钻研中国丰富而复杂的艺术史来改善他们的看法和观点,真正理解并欣赏其对当代中国艺术及其艺术家的影响。

问题始终存在:为什么西方艺术专家和评论家要继续主导被认为创新的、实验性的或全球相关的创新当代中国艺术?怎样才能停止呢?

 

Obstacle 2

Chinese art curators and Western contemporary art curators at American Museums 

7- At this point, I think a little information about me is relevant. I have a master’s degree in Chinese art and language and a minor in Japanese art and language. In my degree program, all of my art classes were devoted to historical Chinese and Japanese art. 

障碍2:美国博物馆的中国艺术策展人和西方当代艺术策展人

在此,我有必要谈一下我的情况。我有中国艺术和语言硕士学位,副修日本艺术和 语言。在我的学位课程中,我的所有艺术课程都致力于历史中国和日本艺术。

8- In 1987 I was hired to be the executive director of the non-profit organization, the Asian Art Coordinating Council, (which I will refer to as the AACC). This organization’s mission was and is to generate new bonds of understanding between Asians and Americans through art exhibits and cultural programs. 

Although I wrote my thesis on Chinese art from the end of the Qing dynasty through 1975, tracing the influences of Western art and Chinese folk art throughout this period, in my early years as Executive Director I continued to work on historic Chinese art exhibits for my organization as well as for other museums. 

1987年,我被聘为非营利组织 -- 亚洲艺术协会(简称AACC)的执行主席。协会的使命一直是通过艺术展览和文化项目在亚洲人民和美国人民之间建立相互理解的新纽带。

尽管我的论文是关于清末至1975年间的中国艺术,追溯这一时期西方艺术和中国民间艺术的影响,但在我担任执行主席的早期,我继续为我的组织和其他博物馆从事中国历史艺术展的工作。

9- However, there was a programming change in 1990, when the AACC developed and implemented its annual Contemporary Asian Art Exhibition series (CAAE), the only event of its kind in the US that annually features contemporary Asian art. To date, we have organized and traveled to the US exhibits from the People's Republic of China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, India, and Japan. Approximately 80% of our 52 exhibits have featured contemporary Chinese art. The goal of this exhibit series is to curate and create exhibits that reflect fast changing China and Asia.

然而,1990年亚洲艺术协会规划有了改变,制定并实施每年一次当代亚洲艺术展系列(CAAE)。这是美国唯一每年以当代亚洲艺术为特色的此类活动。迄今为止,我们已经组织和运来从中华人民共和国、台湾、香港、印度和日本的展览。在我们的52次展览中,约80%为当代中国艺术。这一展览系列的目标是策划和展出反映快速变化的中国和亚洲。

10- In addition to our exhibits, there have been a few early exhibits in America focusing on contemporary Chinese art including the 1993 exhibit China’s New Art -Post 1989, followed by the Asia Society’ s Inside Out exhibit in 1998. However, in the 1990s, America’s knowledge of contemporary Chinese art was still very limited. 

Unless artists were included in the small group of young Chinese artists- whose work was promoted and sold at galleries outside of China- they received little recognition and had few international outlets to sell or display their art. 

除了我们的展览外,美国一些早期的展览也以当代中国艺术为重点,其中有1993年的《1989年后中国新艺术展》,接下来是1998年亚洲协会举办的“由内向外”展览。 然而在20世纪90年代,美国对中国当代艺术的了解仍十分有限。除非艺术家被纳入了一小群年轻的中国艺术家--他们的作品在中国以外的画廊得到了宣传和销售--否则他们几乎没有得到什么认可, 也很少有国际卖场出售或展示他们的艺术。

11- This reality allowed the AACC to keep many of our exhibits’ artwork for several years after their Denver premiers, which allowed us to travel the exhibits to other US and international museums and non-profit locations. Unfortunately, for the most part US Chinese and contemporary Western art museum curators lacked both interest in and understanding of contemporary Chinese art. 

Typically, after sending exhibit information to a museum ‘s Chinese art curator, we were told, since the exhibit featured contemporary Chinese art, that the materials should be sent to the Contemporary Art department. When we sent the materials to museum’s Contemporary Art department, we were told that the exhibit dealt with Chinese art, and in fact needed to be sent to back the Chinese Art department. In general, Chinese art curators and contemporary Western art curators want exhibits that reflect their interests and research areas. 

这一情况使亚洲艺术协会在丹佛首次展览后将许多展品保存几年,得以将展品运到其他美国和国际博物馆以及非盈利地点。不幸的是,在大多数情况下,美国的中国和当代西方艺术馆馆长缺乏对当代中国艺术的兴趣和理解。

通常情况下,向博物馆的中国艺术策展人发送展览信息后,他们常说因为是中国当代艺术展,因此应将材料发送给当代艺术部门。当我们把材料送到博物馆的当代艺术部门时,我们被告知展览涉及中国艺术,应该送回中国艺术部门。一般来说, 中国艺术策展人想要的展品反映了他们的兴趣和研究。

12- Although larger US museums have a number of galleries to display temporary art exhibits, usually that is not the case for the majority of US museums. 

The smaller museums have a limited number of temporary exhibit spaces available each year. As a result, both Chinese art curators and contemporary Western art curators have limited number of opportunities to display exhibits in their own particular areas of interest. 

In addition, the preferences of US museum board and exhibit committee members’ interest was, and still today are focused on historical Chinese art, historical Western art, or contemporary Western art.

Although we continued to send exhibit information to Chinese art museum curators, we also began to focus on non- profit art centers, university museums or galleries, and city galleries, and it is these types of institutions with which we had our most success. 

虽然大型美国博物馆有许多画廊可用作临时艺术展览,但大多数美国博物馆通常不这样做,较小的博物馆每年提供的临时展览空间有限。 因此,中国艺术策展人和当代西方艺术策展人在自己特定的兴趣领域展示展品的机会有限。

这些较小的博物馆每年都有有限数量的临时展览空间,导致他们的中国艺术策展人和当代西方艺术策展人在他们自己感兴趣的特定领域展示展品的机会有限。此外, 美国博物馆董事会和展览委员会成员的兴趣一向是历史上中国的艺术 、西方历史中的艺术或当代西方艺术。 

虽然我们继续向中国艺术术策展人发送展览信息,但我们也开始关注非营利的艺术中心、大学博物馆或画廊以及城市画廊,正是这些类型的机构使我们取得了最大的成功。

13- Typically art center and city gallery curators and directors were knowledgeable about contemporary Western art, but they were not knowledgeable about contemporary Chinese art. Still they were open to displaying it. 

Although these curators and gallery directors were not concerned if the art was by established well-known Chinese artists, or by artists just beginning their careers, they all had the same requirements: 

The exhibit must feature outstanding art along with well-written exhibit copy, and the exhibit needed to appeal to their patrons. To make the exhibits more appealing to university museums and galleries, we linked our exhibit promotional materials to Chinese and Asian studies coursework that was offered on their campus. 

通常,艺术中心和城市画廊策展人/总监都对当代西方艺术有所了解,但对当代中国艺术并不了解。然而,他们仍然愿意展示它。虽然这些策展人和画廊总监并不担心这些作品是由著名的中国知名艺术家,还是艺术家刚刚开始他们的职业生涯,但他们都有相同的要求:展品必须是优秀的艺术品,并附有贴切的文字介绍,另外展览要吸引参观者。为了使展览对大学博物馆和美术馆更具吸引力,我们将展览宣传材料与学校开设的中国和亚洲研究课程联系起来。

14- Today US museums, their contemporary Chinese art collections and the number of exhibits displayed, continue to lag far behind their European and Asian counterparts, but there has been one very significant development since the mid 2000s. 

A number of younger Chinese art curators and art historians entering the field are knowledgeable about historical and contemporary Chinese art. Of course, for the most part, they are not yet in senior curator or faculty positions, and they cannot make decisions about exhibits, collections, or coursework devoted to contemporary Chinese art. 

如今,在美国的博物馆中,中国当代艺术藏品和展览数量仍然远远落后于欧洲和亚洲的同类博物馆。但自2000年代中期以来,有一个非常显著的发展:许多年轻的中国艺术策展人和进入该领域的艺术史学家都对中国历史和当代艺术有着深刻的了解 。当然,在大多数情况下,他们尚未担任高级策展人或教职员工,无法就展览,收藏或致力于当代中国艺术的课程作出决定。

15- Asian focus cultural institutions and museums, like the San Francisco Asian Art Museum, Asia Society, and the China Institute, continue to display contemporary Chinese or Asian art exhibits along with historical Chinese and Asian art exhibits. But typically their patrons are already interested in Asian art. It remains unclear if the members of the general public, with little knowledge of historical or contemporary Asian art, regularly visit these Asian art -focused institutions to view art. 

以关注亚洲为重点的文化机构和博物馆,如旧金山亚洲艺术馆、亚洲协会和中国研究所,继续举办当代中国或亚洲艺术展览以及以历史中国和亚洲艺术展览。但他们的赞助人通常已经对亚洲艺术感兴趣。目前还不清楚,对历代或当代亚洲艺术知之甚少的普通公众是否定期参观这些以亚洲艺术为中心的机构参观艺术品。

16-A few Western contemporary art curators have begun to travel to China to organize contemporary Chinese art exhibits for their US museums. Yet it is doubtful that these contemporary Western art curators have studied Chinese art history or art theory, or can read or speak Chinese. It appears that their opinions about what is considered innovative, experimental or globally relevant contemporary Chinese art are influenced by colleagues or artists who have traveled to China, or their opinions are shaped by the Western art experts and critics who write about the topic in Western art publications 

一些西方当代艺术策展人已经开始前往中国,为他们的美国博物馆组织当代中国艺术展。 然而,这些当代西方艺术策展人是否研究过中国艺术史或艺术理论,或者能够读懂中文或用中文交流还是值得怀疑的。他们当代中国艺术是否具有创新性、实验性或全球性的看法,受到前往中国的同事或艺术家的影响,或者他们的观念受到西方艺术专家和评论家出版物的影响。

17- Fortunately, some US museums with general collections have displayed one person or group exhibits of contemporary Chinese art. Such as 

The 2002 Xu Bing, exhibit at the Freer Sackler Museum

The 2005 group exhibit featuring work by Zhang Huan,and others at Stanford University

The 2006 Liu Xiaodong, exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum 

The 2010 Fresh Ink exhibit at the Boston Museum of Fine Art 

The 2010 Wang Huaqing exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum 

And in 2018 Jerry Yang’s, Ink World exhibit at Stanford University, to name a few. 

幸运的是,一些美国博物馆举办了个人或几个人一起的当代中国艺术展。

如 2002年徐冰,弗里尔·萨克勒博物馆展览;。 

2005年张洹和其他人,斯坦福大学画展;

“2006年刘小东”,西雅图艺术博物馆展览;

2010年波士顿美术馆新水墨画展;

2010,王懷慶在雅图艺术博物馆展出。;

2018年,杨致远家庭(Jerry Yang)水墨画收藏,“墨境”展,斯坦福大学。以上仅举几个例子。

18- In addition to the AACC exhibits, there have also been a number of contemporary Chinese art exhibits displayed at smaller museums, city galleries and university museums throughout the US. However, the number of contemporary Chinese art exhibits is an insignificant portion of the total number of exhibits displayed in US museums and non profit galleries each year. 

There are also a small but growing number of US contemporary Chinese art collectors who are beginning to donate pieces. In the late 2000s Kent and Vicki Logan gave donations of contemporary Chinese art to San Francisco MOMA and to the Denver Art Museum. The trend continues at smaller museums. An example is the recent donation of 122 pieces of contemporary Chinese art dating from the late 1970s- through 2015 from Charles Townley to the University of Southern California's Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena. Then too, 2018 LA County Museum of Art received a large and very impressive Global Contemporary Art Collection ,with a number of contemporary Chinese ink paintings donated by Gerard and Dora Cognie. All this points to some positive movement in appreciating, displaying and collecting contemporary Chinese art, but the movement remains in a developmental stage. 

The issue of winning over Chinese art curators and Western contemporary art curators to appreciate, regularly display and convince their museums to collect contemporary Chinese art persists as a problem, and it is one that needs to be addressed. 

除了亚洲艺术协会的展览,在美国各地的小型博物馆、城市美术馆和大学博物馆也举办了一些当代中国艺术展览。然而,中国当代艺术展览的数量在美国博物馆和非营利画廊每年展览总数中所占比例极低。

也有少数美国当代中国艺术收藏家开始捐赠艺术品,并且这些收藏家越来越多。在20世纪晚期, Kent和Vicki Logan夫妇将当代中国艺术品捐赠给旧金山现代艺术馆和丹佛艺术馆。这种趋势在小型博物馆还在延续。如,近期查尔斯·汤利(Charles Townley)向位于帕萨迪纳的南加州大学太平洋亚洲博物馆捐赠了122件中国当代艺术作品,这些作品可追溯到20世纪70年代末至2015年。此外,2018年洛杉矶县艺术馆也收到了大量有价值的全球当代艺术藏品,其中包括杰拉德和多拉·科涅(Gerard and Dora Cognie)夫妇捐赠的一些当代中国水墨画。这一切都显示中国当代艺术欣赏、展示和收藏正向着好的方向发展,但仍处于发展阶段。

鼓励美国博物馆的中国艺术策展人和西方当代艺术策展人、定期陈列和说服他们的博物馆收藏中国当代艺术是一个一直来都存在的问题,也是一个需要解决的问题。

 

Obstacle 3

The predicament facing contemporary Chinese artists 

19- Today Chinese artists are faced with a major dilemma: in which direction do they go when creating art? There appears be three options open to them: Option One is to create art that is a derivative of Western avant-garde, experimental, global, or transforming art practices. 

This choice enhances the opportunity to have their work reviewed by Western art critics and purchased by Western art collectors. Option Two is to create art that remains within the confines of traditional Chinese art and which appeals primarily to the Chinese market and museums. Option Three, which I think is the best option, is for Chinese artists to incorporate selected Western art techniques and ideas into their own personal Chinese art styles, creating work that is contemporary, but still Chinese. 

障碍3:当代中国艺术家面临的困境 

今天,中国的艺术家面临着一个巨大的困境:他们在创作艺术的时候会朝哪个方向走?他们似乎有三种选择:第一种选择是创造艺术,成为西方先锋派、实验派、全球性或转型艺术实践的衍生。这种选择增加了他们的作品被西方艺术评论家认可,并被西方艺术收藏家购买的机会。第二种选择是创造在中国传统艺术范围内,主要针对中国市场和博物馆的艺术。方案三,我认为是中国艺术家最好的选择,是将精选的西方艺术技术和思想融入到他们自己的中国艺术风格中,创造出当代但仍然是中国的作品。

20- Chinese artists do have a history of incorporating Western art elements and ideas into their art, resulting in work that still is distinctively Chinese. In the late 17th century Jesuit missionary artists began to serve the Qing court and during the reign of three emperors they taught selected Western art techniques and ideas to court artists who featured them in their Chinese paintings. In the first part of the 20th century Xu Beihong combined Western art techniques and modeling with his Chinese ink painting. German Expressionist art techniques and ideas impacted Chinese print artists in the 1930s, and Socialist Realist art from Russia had a major influence on Chinese art in China. 

中国艺术家确实有这样的先例,即将西方艺术元素和思想融入到他们的艺术中,因此他们的作品仍然具有鲜明的中国特色。17世纪后期,耶稣会传教士艺术家开始为清朝朝廷服务,并在三代皇帝统治期间向宫廷艺术家选择性地传授西方艺术技巧和思想,这些中国艺术家在他们的中国画中表现出西方的特色。20世纪上半叶,徐悲鸿将西方艺术手法和与中国水墨画相结合。德国表现主义艺术的技术和思想在20世纪30年代影响了中国的版画艺术家,俄罗斯的社会主义现实主义艺术也对中国艺术产生了重大影响。

21- Today, some Chinese artists are drawing inspiration from a variety of Western materials and media, including the electronic technologies, such as digital imaging and the Internet, as well as traditional Chinese techniques, creating work that has been influenced by West, but that is still distinctively Chinese. 

But why should contemporary Chinese artists work be judged using the Western art system, allowing the West to determine which art is relevant to China, and to the international art arena? 

今天,一些中国艺术家从各种西方材料和媒体中汲取灵感,包括电子技术,如数字成像和互联网,以及中国传统技术,创作受西方影响的作品,但仍然独具中国特色。

但是,为什么当代中国艺术家的作品应该用西方艺术体系来评判,让西方人决定哪种艺术与中国和国际艺术舞台相关?

 

In Conclusion

22- It was American’s unprecedented rise to economic and military power after WWII that resulted in a time of prosperity, its confidence as a nation, and the unfettered optimism of its citizens believing that anything was possible in life and art in post World War II. Would it have been possible for Jackson Pollock to create his Drip art in England in the aftermath of World War II? I think not. Pollock and his fellow artists were products of a superpower county, one that exercised financial and military power throughout the world. 

From the 19th century to mid 20th century, this power resided in Europe which became the major hub of Western artistic activity and where great art movements flourished like Romanticism, Impressionism, Post- Impressionism, Cubism, and Dadaism, to name a few. 

But after WWII, the international art power base shifted to America, where new art movements developed such as, Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, Minimalism, Photorealism, among others. But nowhere on the numerous lists of international art movements is a contemporary Chinese art movement listed. 

结论: 

第二次世界大战后,美国经济和军事力量空前崛起,导致了一个繁荣的时期,美国作为一个国家的信心,以及美国公民相信在二战后的美国生活和艺术中任何事都有可能的自由乐观主义。第二次世界大战结束后,杰克逊·波洛克是否有可能在英国创作他的点滴艺术?我想不可能。波洛克和与之相似的艺术家们是一个超级大国的国家的产物,而这个国家在世界各地行使着财政和军事权力。

从19世纪到20世纪中叶,这种力量在欧洲,欧洲成为西方艺术活动的主要中心,一些伟大的艺术运动,如新古典主义浪漫主义、后印象主义、象征主义、野兽派、立体主义、未来主义和达达主义等在此蓬勃发展。

但二战后,国际艺术权力基础转移到了美国,美国出现了新的艺术运动,如抽象表现主义、流行艺术、极简主义、照片现实主义等。但在我所评阅的众多西方国际艺术运动清单中,没有一个列出当代中国艺术运动。

23- In America we have a well-known saying. There are two things in life that one cannot avoid: death and taxes, I would like to add a third: change. At some point during the 21st century, Western contemporary art experts, critics and curators, as well as Chinese art experts, critics and curators will be faced with change, for the reality is the world’s economic and military power base is shifting from the US; soon it will be in Asia, especially China and India. 

在美国,我们有一句名言。生活中有两件事是不能避免的:死亡和税收。我想再加上第三条:变化。在21世纪的某一时刻,西方当代艺术专家、评论家和策展人,以及中国的艺术专家、评论家和策展人都将面临变革,因为世界经济和军事实力基础正在从美国转移,很快它将移到亚洲,特别是中国和印度。

24- I believe Chinese art critics, curators and art historians, who have studied both Chinese and Western art history and theory, and who are conversant in both English and Chinese, will play an essential role. They will become the major arbitrators of what is considered innovative, experimental or globally relevant contemporary Chinese, and perhaps even contemporary Western art. 

They, unlike their Western predecessors, will not view contemporary Chinese art from a single Western lens, but by what I call a bifocal lens, one that reflects their knowledge of Chinese art history and theory ,as well as Western art history and theory. It is here, within this bifocal lens, that contemporary Chinese art’s universal success can finally be realized. 

我相信中国艺术评论家,策展人和艺术史学家,他们研究中西艺术史和理论,并且熟悉中英文,将发挥重要作用,成为判定当代中国艺术甚至西方艺术是否具有实验性、符合全球语境的主要仲裁者。与西方前辈不同,他们不会从单一的西方镜头中看待当代中国艺术,而是通过我所说的双焦镜头来反映他们对中国艺术史和理论以及西方艺术史和理论的认识。 正是在这个双焦点镜头中,中国当代艺术的普遍成功才能最终实现。