三十年淬煉對世界的探問 常陵「假如故鄉」呈現創作的全面性
文｜異雲書屋
「假如故鄉――常陵 個展」將於2026年5月16日起至6月20日，於異雲書屋青田館展出。本展覽為異雲書屋自2024年10月起經紀代理藝術家常陵後，第一次在畫廊空間正式推出之個展，對於畫廊與藝術家而言，皆屬重要的里程碑。常陵構思本次個展發表的呈現方式，有別於早期以單一繪畫為主體的陳列安排，而是延續他在2023年於台北當代藝術館的個展「戰前準備」，或可更往前追溯至2019年於高雄美術館的個展「大玄玄社會――歷史日常」一隅，將展場全域視為藝術家主體的延伸，因此，展覽中的每一件作品在實質與象徵層面上，都應視為常陵在創作時那些飛快閃現的「念頭」顯影。本次展覽同時呈現了「五花肉」、「大玄玄社會」、「大塊之形」、「假性自大」、「瀕臨樂土」、「假如故鄉」等子題，亦因它們在此「集合」，並且不再如歸檔分類般隔斷彼此，在常陵創作生涯的發展中，有關於藝術家主體的多樣性、經驗與時間的延續性，以及他與作品之間的關係，能夠更為清晰的浮現，從而可深入圖像，望向一個藝術家與其生命、經驗、思想乃至作品的全貌。
「假如故鄉」此一題目來自於常陵對「故鄉的抽象性」之提問：「故鄉這種東西太抽象了，它的抽象性在於記憶的重組，還有新的東西添加上來，那麼在這種添加的過程當中也被扭曲了；或者是添加進來的東西，其實也不是我的東西，比較像是集體意識灌輸進來的一些，味道、聲音、畫面，所以才會有『假如』這兩個字的存在。」他以這個提問為起點，觀察當代人類在獲取資訊與經驗感知的過程中，兩者相互生成又再次傳播的現象。當日常生活、社會氛圍到國際局勢的變動，那些氾濫的訊息，無間歇地進駐人們的身心世界，不斷改變以往理解世界的方式，人們在這樣的過程裡，將會處於一種既安全又焦慮的狀態――似乎我們都比過去更加看清這個世界，卻也比任何時候更難辨認自身的位置。
常陵亦曾提及，在他腦海中的念頭總是不斷地快速浮現，而他必須望著卻不追隨地，觀測那些勉強辨識的念頭。可以理解的是，既然「超速」已成為時代的慣性，迅速理解、即刻表態，在亂流之中，人們既渴望也越發依賴那些明確又肯定，接近真理般的敘事，且有逐漸「均一化」的跡象，那麼似乎只有在刻意停頓的空檔，能夠暫停於世界訊號的被動接收，並射出個體主動回應的一箭之地。
因此，常陵對於自身所處時代所拋出的種種疑問，方是其創作真正可貴之處。無論是他在巴黎的行為裝置作品〈One Day I Will Ask Nothing〉透過八面乞討來表達一種「因為現在什麼都沒有，所以什麼都需要」的人類處境；或是藉「五花肉」系列作品反思在巴黎遭遇「你是亞洲人，為什麼作品沒有東方味？」的提問，當透明油彩在畫布上流淌出故鄉的鮮肉，一種有別於西方繪畫且專屬於常陵的創作語境便橫空出世；然而與此同時，常陵察覺到繪畫的慣性一但被構建完成，創造力便會同時受限於身體慣性的問題，這激發他在不斷地自我提問中，開展出「大玄玄社會」這一昇華至人與社會關係的命題，荒誕又日常的人性眾生相，時而銳利、時而抹糊地撩撥起事件當中的情緒張力；而「大塊之形」真切地直面意識升起的源頭，即常陵所言「念頭的頭」，它們在腦海中如大潮一般漲退，或翻湧或消散，皆無定形，於是他出離於具象的形體，以抽象對應心神的一瞬又一瞬；「假性自大」則狂想似地在老照片上塗鴉，分岔出錯置的現實，原先的脈絡早已遺失，而未來的記憶是否屬於記憶的一部分，或可類比於人類凝視古物或一段過往時間的奇詭心態；近期的「瀕臨樂土」描繪人心憧憬的幸福生活，似乎近在咫尺，卻在物理或者精神上將到未到，遂而成為須以一生追尋的遠方；而「假如故鄉」展現出世界本處於流動之中的真實，以及在流動之中，當代人如何在演算法與影像生成機制日益深刻的影響中，意識到弔詭並擁抱不確定之處，重新辨認自身經驗的真實性。
異雲書屋期望能藉由「假如故鄉」展覽為引，將常陵於過去超過三十年的創作累積，以一種更全面的方式向觀眾展現，正如常陵在最近的一次訪談表示：「但是不知不覺地，它(積累的繪畫概念)會呈現一個以我為主體的多樣性，那麼這個多樣性可能在某一個層面上來說，它才應該是對於創作主體上面的議題，更能夠去表達，身為一個藝術家的種種的面向，種種的歷程，而不是只是在一個面向當中重複地呈現，如果一直在一個面向當中重複呈現的話，就像是一道光打在這個藝術家身上，你只能看到他的右半臉，而看不到他的全貌。」
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An Inquiry into the World, Tempered over Three Decades: Chang Ling’s If My Homeland Presents the Full Scope of His Artistic Practice
by YIYUN ART
“If My Homeland: Chang Ling solo exhibition” will be presented at Yi Yun Art Qingtian from May 16 to June 20, 2026. As the first solo exhibition formally staged in the gallery space since Yi Yun Art began representing Chang Ling in October 2024, the exhibition marks an important milestone for both the gallery and the artist.
In conceiving the presentation of this exhibition, Chang Ling departs from his earlier mode of display, which centered primarily on individual paintings. Instead, the exhibition extends the spatial approach seen in his 2023 solo exhibition War Preparation at MoCA Taipei, and perhaps may be traced even further back to one part of his 2019 solo exhibition Illusion Society: Historical Daily at the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts. Here, the entire exhibition space is regarded as an extension of the artist’s subjectivity. In this sense, each work in the exhibition, both materially and symbolically, may be understood as the manifestation of those rapidly flickering “thoughts” that emerge in Chang Ling’s creative process.
This exhibition brings together several of Chang Ling’s major bodies of work, including Streaky Pork, Illusion Society, The Great Clod, Pseudo-Arrogance, On the Brink of Paradise, and If My Homeland. Precisely because these series are gathered here without being separated into archival categories, the exhibition allows the multiplicity of the artist’s subjectivity, the continuity of experience and time, and the relationship between the artist and his works to become more clearly visible within the trajectory of Chang Ling’s practice. Through the images, viewers are invited to look toward a fuller picture of an artist’s life, experience, thought, and body of work.
The title If My Homeland originates from Chang Ling’s inquiry into “the abstractness of homeland.” As he states: “Homeland is something deeply abstract. Its abstractness lies in the reorganization of memory, and in the addition of new things. Through this process of addition, it also becomes distorted. Or perhaps the things being added are not really mine. They are more like things instilled by a collective consciousness: smells, sounds, images. That is why the word ‘if’ exists in the title.”
Taking this question as a point of departure, Chang Ling observes the ways in which contemporary human beings acquire information and perceive experience, and how the two generate one another before being circulated once again. As daily life, social atmosphere, and international circumstances continue to shift, the overwhelming flow of information enters our physical and psychological worlds without pause, constantly altering the ways in which we once understood reality. In this process, we seem to find ourselves in a state that is both secure and anxious: as though we can see the world more clearly than before, while finding it harder than ever to recognize where we stand within it.
Chang Ling has also mentioned that thoughts are constantly and rapidly surfacing in his mind, and that he must look at them without following them, observing those barely discernible thoughts as they arise. It may be understood that, once “overspeeding” has become the inertia of our time, people are increasingly expected to understand quickly and take a position immediately. Amid such turbulence, we both desire and increasingly depend on narratives that appear clear, assured, and almost truth-like. These narratives also seem to show a gradual tendency toward homogenization. Under such conditions, perhaps only in a deliberately suspended pause can we cease the passive reception of signals from the world, and open a space from which the individual may send forth an active response.
It is therefore Chang Ling’s questions toward the age in which he lives that form the true value of his practice. In his performance-installation work One Day I Will Ask Nothing in Paris, he expressed, through the act of begging in eight directions, a human condition of “needing everything because one has nothing at present.” In the Streaky Pork series, he reflected on a question he once encountered in Paris: “You are Asian, so why does your work show no trace of your cultural background?” As transparent oil paint flowed across the canvas to form the fresh flesh of homeland, a creative context distinct from Western painting, and singularly belonging to Chang Ling, emerged with striking force.
At the same time, Chang Ling became aware that once a habitual mode of painting has been established, creativity may also become constrained by the body’s habitual gestures. This realization prompted him, through continuous self-questioning, to develop Illusion Society, a proposition elevated toward the relationship between human beings and society. In this series, absurd yet everyday portraits of human nature stir the emotional tension within events, at times sharply and at times in a blurred, indistinct manner.
The Great Clod confronts the source from which consciousness arises, what Chang Ling refers to as “the first stirring of thought.” These thoughts rise and recede in the mind like great tides; they surge, disperse, and remain without fixed form. Thus, he departs from figurative form, using abstraction to respond to the successive instants of the mind and spirit.
Pseudo-Arrogance unfolds like a fantasy through graffiti-like markings on old photographs, branching into misplaced realities. The original context has long been lost, while the question of whether future memory may also belong to memory itself perhaps echoes the strange mentality with which human beings gaze upon antiquities, or upon a passage of time from the past.
The recent series On the Brink of Paradise depicts the happy life longed for by the human heart. It seems close at hand, yet remains physically or spiritually not quite arrived, and thus becomes a distant place one must pursue throughout life.
If My Homeland reveals the truth that the world itself is always in flux. Within this state of flux, it asks how contemporary human beings, under the increasingly profound influence of algorithms and image-generating mechanisms, may come to recognize paradox, embrace uncertainty, and once again discern the authenticity of their own experience.
Through If My Homeland, Yi Yun Art hopes to present Chang Ling’s more than three decades of artistic accumulation to audiences in a more comprehensive manner. As Chang Ling recently remarked in an interview: “So now, for me, to record these things from the past, these painting concepts, or certain things from the past, you might call them inspiration. But because they move so quickly, I think it is difficult to describe them that way. “Yet without my noticing, it (the accumulated concepts of painting) comes to present a kind of diversity centered on myself as the subject. Perhaps, on a certain level, this diversity is what better addresses the question of the creative subject. It is better able to express the many facets and many processes of being an artist, rather than simply repeating and presenting a single aspect. If one keeps repeating within a single aspect, it is like a beam of light shining on the artist: you can only see the right side of his face, but not the whole picture.”
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