Q&A ｜ Lean Lui #灵光与困境

我一直在实践中叩问当代摄影的灵光与困境。

如果摄影继续沿习「纪实性摄影」与「画意摄影」这两条路，困在「拍什么」而不是「怎么拍」中，它将永远逃脱不出「可复制性」与「重现」的痛点，摄影的方向其实有很多，无相机摄影的探索其实在1848年已经开始，但从来不是一个主流。摄影术是作为辅助绘画的工具出身，如同一位妾室，而当代摄影这位妾室转正的过程，是摄影术如何逃脱「工具」这一身份而建立一个完整自我认知的过程，当我们使用摄影这个媒介的时候，很重要的一点是「用摄影做绘画与纪录」还是「用摄影做艺术」。

故此，使用这种好像专门为现实而设的媒介呈现抽象，是希望能够拓阔摄影这个媒介的边界，将摄影从再现的困局中拉出来一点，往解放和自由走近一点。

如果我再缩小这个题目的范围的话，就是以我这一次的摄影作品与传统绘画中的抽象画相比。

摄影的希腊文是photo-graphy（光-绘），我的出发点是摄影的本质——光与感光物料，当然还有一大堆化学物。

在这次实验性的作品中，我玩索而有得地探索了光线不同的呈现形式，例如我在使用银盐相纸时，光线在洗衣机的高速旋转之下从针孔透入相纸，泡在不同浓度与配方的药水下，最终呈现出如万根银针（因为有银物质）畅游在相纸上的画面，闪闪发光、波光粼粼，这是我毕生难忘的画面。这是一种想像，也是一种验证，光线是存在的，但我们能够邀请它以怎么样的姿态呈现再我们面前呢？这就像摄影史上非常著名的「赛马赌局」，我们借用摄影术看到了无法用肉眼看到也无法以脑袋预判再画出来的东西。我们不单要拍看到的画面，更要拍看不到的画面，这才是摄影在艺术上的意义。

涉及但不强调。这次的作品启发自我用易经占卜后得出的「随」卦，是我个人一向对国学研究的兴趣，而将以感光相纸折叠成的针孔相机暴力地扔到墙上或放进高速滚动的洗衣机里，是当时情绪的发泄，我想要这个作品既有很暴力粗糙的创作手段，但也要有绝对精准和严谨过程，例如暗房与相机的设计、药剂的浓度、显影的时间等。但对于观众来说，这个作品观赏的点主要在于新的感光手法与最终的画面呈现，所以没有特别强调当中的叙事性。

不会，装饰属性与文化属性不违背不冲突，糖衣炮弹挺有趣的。

摄影目前对我来说唯一的独特属性是以光成像，以后可能连这一点也会改变，也可能是我的日后创作不会再被归类为摄影。

对于这次展出的感光系列，以光成像的方式都是我探索的方向，光源、感光手法、感光物料、最终的成像效果与展示方法都是一个充满未知、一个庞大的探索空间。

对于纯摄影作品，这里面的「怎么拍」也是一个很大的探索空间，除了视觉元素，一套完整清晰的创作逻辑更能体现作品的完整度。有的作品可以用绘画思维去做，从抽象或具象的画面去进行情绪、氛围、叙事等表达，有的可以用现成物雕塑的思维去做，对于现成物，则拍摄对象的解构再建构等，也有的用Ai、用观念、用行为……

对于我个人创作整体而言，我也很喜欢写作，所以以往也有视觉小说的作品，所以很似乎情况而定。总的来说，我会继续拓展摄影的边界同时不会被单一样媒介局限整体创作。

我觉得是。

会。这个课程一直关注在扩宽摄影的边界。课堂上都是西方的哲学家，现象学的比较多。我可能受家庭的影响比较多，家父是研究《易经》与道学的，也有出版易经桌游。从小我和妹妹就跟着爸爸读《道德经》、《中庸》、《大学》等经典，《易经》是大学才开始读的，说实话我没什么人生经验比较难读，但日常遇到什么事还是会起起卦。我最喜欢看曾仕强博士的讲堂，觉得他的形象跟我读《道德经》时幻想老子那种老顽童的形象和气质挺贴近的，他们对我最大的启发是经典这个东西一定要「玩索而有得」地去读去用，像这次展览的作品也是起卦来的，我记得我那次的问是「当代摄影的去向」，我不是抱着一种算命的心态去占，而是当作这是一种帮助我发散性思维和趋吉避凶的工具。刚好摄影与哲学就是我最喜欢的两样东西，所以我很适应当代摄影无法与哲学脱钩这个特性。

有的，我受到了不少观念艺术家的影响，例如杉本博司、黄永砯、John Cage，他们都是用到东方哲学与国学作为创作主题的艺术家，像有我最喜欢的《易经》和道学。我更强调的差异性是视觉画面上的张力和刺激，你也可以说是装饰性。

平时纯摄影作品的话还有点关系，这次抽象作品确实关系不大。

时尚摄影与艺术摄影，一个要安全一个要危险，很多时候只能用艺术的风格去做时尚摄影，而不能用本质去做。虽然都注重视觉效果，但像这次的系列最终呈现的画面不是我事先可以预设好的，而时尚摄影的画面很多时候是我事先可以预设好的。共通的地方可能是我在拍时尚摄影也会加入艺术概念，因为我拍时尚的风格还是偏向自己在纯摄影创作的风格，没有太商业化，当然，但最终呈现出来的那个比例还是看客户取舍。

In my practice, I have been asking questions about the miraculous brightness and dilemma of contemporary photography.

If photography continues to follow the paths of 'documentary photography' and 'pictorial photography', trapped in 'what to photograph' rather than 'how to photograph', it will never escape from the pains of 'replicability' and 'reproduction'. Photography was born as a tool to assist painting, like a concubine. And contemporary photography, the process of this concubine becoming a wife is a process of how photography can escape its status as a 'tool' and establish a complete self-concept. When we use the medium of photography, it is important to note whether we are 'using photography as painting and documentation' or 'using photography as art'.

Therefore, by using this medium dedicated to reality to present abstraction, we hope to broaden the boundaries of photography as a medium, pull photography out of the trap of reproduction and move closer to liberation and freedom.

If I were to narrow down the scope of this topic, it would be to compare my photographic work this time with the abstraction of traditional painting.

The Greek word for photography is photo-graphy, and my starting point is the essence of photography – light and light-sensitive materials and, of course, a whole host of chemicals.

For example, when I used silver salt paper, the light penetrated the paper through the needle holes at the high speed of the washing machine. It soaked it in different concentrations and formulas of water, resulting in a picture of a million silver needles (because of the silver substance) swimming on the paper, shimmering and shimmering, an image I will never forget. It is an imagination and a verification that light exists, but in what form can we invite it to appear before us again? It's like the famous 'horse racing betting' in the history of photography, where we use photography to see something that we can't see with our eyes or predict with our heads. It is not only about what we see but also about what we don't see, which is what photography is about in art.

It is involved but not emphasised. This work was inspired by my personal interest in the study of Chinese studies, the "Sui" trigram, which I came up with after using The Book of Changes, and the violent throwing of a pinhole camera made of folded photographic paper against a wall or into a high-speed washing machine was an outlet for my emotions at the time. I wanted the work to be very violent and crude but also to have absolute precision and rigour, such as the design of the darkroom and camera, the concentration of the chemicals, the time of development, etc.. However, for the viewers, the main point of this work is the new photographic technique and the final image, so there is no particular emphasis on the narrative aspect of it.

No, decorative attributes do not contradict or conflict with cultural attributes. The sugar coated bullet is quite interesting.

The only unique attribute of photography for me at the moment is that it is an image of light, and even that may change in the future, or it may be that my future work will no longer be categorised as photography.

For a series like the light-sensitive series in this exhibition, the way in which light is used is a direction I am exploring. The light source, the light-sensitive method, the light-sensitive material, the final effect, and the display method are all unknown and a vast space to explore.

For pure photography, the 'how to shoot' is also an ample space to explore. Apart from the visual elements, a complete and clear set of creative logic can better reflect the completeness of the work. Some works can be done with a pictorial mindset, expressing mood, atmosphere and narrative from abstract or figurative images; some can be done with the mentality of sculpting ready-made objects, deconstructing and reconstructing the objects for mass-produced objects; and some use Ai, concepts and performance ……

For my work as a whole, I also enjoy writing, so I have done visual novels in the past, so it depends on the situation. In general, I will continue to expand the boundaries of photography while not being limited by a single medium as a whole.

I think so.

Yes. The course has always been concerned with widening the boundaries of photography. The content mostly concerns Western philosophers, has more phenomenology. I'm more influenced by my family. My father studied The Book of Changes and Daoism and also published The Book of Changes board games. From a young age, my sister and I read the Tao Te Ching, The Doctrine of the Mean and The Great Learning with my father. I only started reading The Book of Changes at university, and to be honest, I had little life experience; it was more challenging to read, but I would still get up my trigrams when I encountered something on a daily basis. I like to watch Dr Tsang's lectures the most because his image is similar to the image and temperament of the older man I imagined Laozi to be when I read the Tao Te Ching. The greatest inspiration for me is that the classics must be read and used in a "playful manner", as in the case of the works in this exhibition, which are also the result of Initiate divination. I remember that my question was "Where is contemporary photography going? ", I didn't go into divination with a fortune-telling mindset. Instead, I saw it as a tool to help me think differently and avoid bad luck. Photography and philosophy are two of my favourite things, so I'm very much in tune with the fact that contemporary photography can't be disassociated from philosophy.

Yes, I have been influenced by many conceptual artists, such as Hiroshi Sugimoto, Huang Yongpinging and John Cage, all of whom use Eastern philosophy and Chinese studies as themes in their work, such as The Book of Changes and Daoism, which are my favourites. The difference I emphasise more is the tension and stimulation of the visual images. You could say decorative.

In fashion photography and art photography, one has to be safe, and one has to be dangerous. Often, you can only do fashion photography in an artistic style rather than in its essence. Although both focus on visual effects, the final images in this series, for example, are not pre-determined by me, whereas in fashion photography, I can often pre-determine the pictures in advance. The commonality is that I also add artistic concepts to fashion photography because my style of fashion photography is still biased towards my own style of pure photography practice, not too commercial, but of course, the final proportion of the presentation is still dependent on the client's choice.