Footnotes

Provenance
Schoeni Art Gallery, Hong Kong (acquired directly from the artist)
Collection of the Schoeni Family

Exhibited
Hong Kong, Schoeni Art Gallery, Latitude/Attitude: Schoeni Art Gallery 20th Anniversary Exhibition, 26 November 2012 - 2 February 2013

Literature
Schoeni Art Gallery Ltd.,Latitude/Attitude: Schoeni Art Gallery 20th Anniversary, Hong Kong, 2012, p.123, illustrated in colour

劉小東
形影不離
油彩 畫布
1991年作

簽名︰小东1991 (左上)；形影不离 100 X 73 CM 劉小东 1991（背面）

背面貼有少勵畫廊標籤

此作附少勵畫廊開立之作品保證書

拍品部分收益將撥捐香港癌症基金會

來源
香港少勵畫廊（得自藝術家本人）
少勵家族收藏

展覽
「緯度/態度 — 少勵畫廊二十周年展」，少勵畫廊，香港， 2012年11月26日 - 2013年2月2日

出版
《緯度/態度︰少勵畫廊二十周年展》，少勵畫廊，香港，2012年，第123頁，彩圖

Executed in 1991, Liu Xiaodong's Lovers is an exceptionally rare self-portrait by the artist featuring not just himself but also his lover, fellow painter Yu Hong. As an extremely early piece, the highly accomplished Lovers already illuminates Liu Xiaodong's extraordinary prowess in the genres of portraiture and realism from the very nascence of his career. The artist's exacting technique and unaffected directness of his brushwork is echoed by the sparse, concise, yet powerfully eloquent composition.

Yu Hong embraces her lover from behind, encircling her arms around his body. Liu Xiaodong's hands are loosely folded over his lover's tightly clasped palms; a casual, relaxed, yet telling posture evocative of love, comfort, and protection. While Liu Xiaodong appears lost in a reverie, Yu Hong's gaze is direct, piercing, even coyly provocative. Anchoring the composition is the young lovers' gracefully interlocking forearms, their bare skin and long fingers enacting a dialogue that is simple, unpretentious, yet rich with emotion. An exquisite testament to the superlative power of Liu Xiaodong's unique brand of Neo-Realism, Lovers captures a deeply private moment, and in so doing manifests a quietly revolutionary encapsulation of a gravely estranged chapter of contemporary society—a feat that anchors the very core of Liu Xiaodong's greater oeuvre.

Undisputedly one of the greatest Chinese artists of the present generation, Liu Xiaodong occupies a singular position within the history of Chinese contemporary art. In 1989, when Liu Xiaodong participated in the landmark exhibition "China Avant-Garde", his straightforward, apathetic realism was at odds with the bombastic satire of Cynical Realism and Political Pop. Espousing a detached documentary style that subtly yet powerfully conveyed the conflicting energies of society at the time, Liu Xiaodong swiftly emerged in the 1990s as a leading figure of a new generation of Neo-Realist painters, with his adherence to figurative painting amounting to a kind of conceptual stance in an age dominated by photographic media. Encapsulated within his stark unembellished scenes are gently heart-wrenching medleys of the most human of emotions: tension, anxiety, despair, passive acceptance, and silent revelry within the small joys of everyday life. In terms of technique, Liu Xiaodong's loose brushwork and thickly applied paint convey the abstract potential of the medium while preserving a high degree of realism. Although Lucian Freud was an early and defining influence, what is noteworthy for the present Lovers is that in 1991, Liu Xiaodong had yet to see Freud's works in real life, having only encountered them in books and pictures.

Simultaneously tender, enigmatic, and infinitely arresting by way of Yu Hong's gaze, at the heart of Lovers lies a profound mystery. The architecture of the painting implies the unseen presence of either a camera lens or a mirror: Was Liu Xiaodong painting from a photograph? If so, who took the photo, and where is the camera? Was he painting himself and his lover as live models, using a mirror? If so, where is the easel and brush? And who is Yu Hong looking at—herself, her lover, or the viewer? In a similar vein to Diego Velázquez's Las Meninas (1656), Liu Xiaodong's Lovers evokes multiple relationships: that between husband and wife, artist and fellow artist, the male subject and his internal psyche, and finally, both subjects and the external voyeur, be it the painter, the cameraman, or the scores of viewers to encounter the painting in the infinite future present.

Little known to many, around the time Lovers was painted, Liu Xiaodong and Yu Hong were cast in the leading roles of Wang Xiaoshuai's film The Days (1993), a film that was never released commercially in China but won prestigious awards at international film festivals. Shot in black and white, The Days follows the lives of an artist couple. In director Wang Xiaoshuai's words: "... there may not be an obvious story line in The Days, but at least it presents the truth about the lives of people from my generation" (Michael Berry, 'Wang Xiaoshuai: Banned in China', in Speaking in Images: Interviews with Contemporary Chinese Filmmakers (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), p. 167). In one scene, Chun (played by Yu Hong) stops and gazes directly at the camera for a sustained moment—a scene uncannily echoed by Yu Hong's gaze in the present work. Upon repeated viewings, one cannot decide whether Yu Hong's gaze is tantalizing or passive, inviting or apathetic. Endlessly alluring, her frozen, infinitely sustained gaze in Lovers encapsulates the documentary impulse that drives Liu Xiaodong's painterly oeuvre as well as the singularly poignant apathy that pervades the very best of his creations.

在1991年完成的劉小東的《形影不離》是一幅非常罕見的藝術家自畫像，不僅描繪了他自己，還描繪了他的妻子、同為畫家的喻紅。作為一幅早期的作品，《形影不離》已經展示了劉小東在肖像畫和寫實主義方面非凡的才能。藝術家精確的技巧和率性的筆觸，直接、扼要卻又強烈地表現了作品的情感。

喻紅從後面擁抱著她的愛人，雙臂環繞著他的身體。劉小東的手傭懶地疊在愛人緊緊扣住的手掌上；儼然一個休閒、放鬆，卻充滿愛意、舒適和保護的姿態。劉小東的神情彷彿陷入沉思，而𣈥紅的眼神卻顯得直接、銳利，甚至略帶挑釁。畫面的焦點落在這對年輕戀人優雅地交錯的前臂上，裸露的肌膚和修長的手指展現了簡單、真實卻充滿情感的對話。作為劉小東獨特新寫實主義風格的見證，《形影不離》捕捉了藝術家與愛人深刻的私密時刻。同時，將劉小東作品的核心概念—隱藏在當代社會疏離之下真實情感，展現出來。

劉小東無庸置疑是當代中國藝術最偉大的藝術家之一，在中國當代藝術史中獨樹一幟。1989年，當劉小東參加具有里程碑意義的「中國前衛」展覽時，他那直接、沉靜的現實主義與玩世寫實主義和政治波普的浮誇諷刺形成鮮明對比。在一個被攝影媒介主導的時代，他堅持具象繪畫，以一種概念性的立場，表現出冷靜的紀實風格，微妙而有力地傳達了當時社會的矛盾能量。在1990年代，劉小東迅速崛起為新一代新寫實主義畫家的代表人物。在他樸實無華的場景中，蘊含著最人性化的情感：緊張、焦慮、絕望、被動接受和在日常生活中難以言喻的小確幸。在繪畫技巧方面，劉小東厚塗、隨性的筆觸，既表現了油畫媒材的可能性，又保留了高度的寫實性。雖然盧西安·弗洛伊德對劉小東早期作品有絕對性的影響，但在1991年創作《形影不離》時，劉小東沒有親眼見過他的作品，只有從書本或圖片中看過。

《形影不離》這幅畫同時充滿著柔情、神秘的氣質和吸引力，其中的核心謎團在於喩紅凝視的方式。這幅畫的構圖暗示了拍攝者使用了相機鏡頭或者鏡子：劉小東是從照片中作畫的嗎？如果是，照片是誰拍攝的？相機在哪裡？他是將自己和愛人作為現場模特兒，利用鏡子進行繪畫的嗎？如果是，畫架和畫筆在哪裡？而喻紅凝視的是誰——是自己、愛人還是觀眾？和·委拉斯開茲的《宮女》（1656）一樣，劉小東的《形影不離》喚起了多種關係：戀人之間的關係、藝術家和藝術家之間的關係、男性主體和他的內在心理之間的關係，最終，還有兩個主體和外部觀者之間的關係，無論是畫家、攝影師還是無數未來會遇到的觀眾。

很少人知道的是，在《形影不離》完成之時，劉小東和喻紅擔任了王小帥的電影《冬春的日子》（1993）的主演。這部電影在中國從未在中國的戲院中上映，但卻在國際電影節上贏得了重要獎項。《冬春的日子》以黑白攝影的方式呈現一對藝術家夫婦的生活。導演王小帥說：「...也許《冬春的日子》沒有明顯的故事情節，但至少它呈現了我這一代人的生活真相」（Michael Berry，《影像對話：當代中國電影製片人訪談》，紐約：哥倫比亞大學出版社，2005，第167頁）。在一個場景中，春（由喻紅飾演）停下來直視攝影機，持續了一段時間——這一幕與喻紅在《形影不離》中的凝視形成了奇妙的回響。反覆觀看後，人們無法確定喻紅的凝視是具有誘惑力的還是被動的、邀請的還是冷漠的。她靜止的、持續不斷的凝視在《形影不離》中永不衰退，體現了驅動劉小東創作的對紀實的衝動，以及他頂級作品中那種獨特的、深層沈著的情感。