The outline for my book (that will not be published) , Eng

Jianghu and Empire: Cultural Geographies in Chinese Contemporary Art

Background:

In Postmodern Geographies, Edward W Soja commented on an obsession with time in 19th century: time is considered to be rich and dialectic; space, to the contrary, is regarded as "the dead, the fixed, the undialectical,the immobile". In the fields of critical theory and epistemological production, the temporally-focused point of view
was expressed in the form of obsession with history and idling of geography. Although academic stars like Foucault had already expressed doubt towards this hegemony, it is obvious that enthusiasm about history in critical and
cultural theory has not yet faded away. In the contemporary art scene, the obsession is manifested as a drive towards art history. Although there are scholars who investigate the cultural geography of (Chinese) contemporary
art, the results are generally either regional stereotypes or absorption of cultural geography into art history. This essay aims at investigating Chinese contemporary art with reference to two spatially-oriented concepts:jianghu
and Empire.

Empire, a significant text by Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt, virtually maps the narrative and diagnosis on the sovereignty "Empire" in the context of globalization. (Although Negri's Marxist reference may raise suspicion about the possibility of historicism, the spatiality of Empire acts as a plane of immanence to thought.) The concept of "Empire" already existed during the Roman Empire, but Negri and Hardt's Empire in the context of globalization is not simply a heritage of antiquity, but also a fracture motivated by capital. The ceaseless self-production of capital
as a cancerous body-without-organs drives towards over-top national-states and super-national organisms while capital endlessly reproduces its own pattern. This ceaseless reproduction results in a weakening of the
independence of nation-states, which, along with other super-national organisms, are accommodated by the capitalist apparatus and "united under the logic of the single rule." The result is a new form of sovereignty: Empire.

The development of info-technology shortens or even erases the physical distances and hence strengthens the influence of Empire. Subjects are passively subsumed by the new sovereignty, like bodies inscribed with medical signs. The concept of Empire takes a crucial role in the production and identification of Chinese contemporary art.
Apart from Empire,jianghu is another cultural concept that is inseparable from the cultural geography of Chinese contemporary art.

jianghu, literally "rivers and lakes," initially referred to a name collectively for rivers and lakes. The term then transformed over time and becomes a word standing for either: the habitat of the hermit; or the environment where you min(the people who are outside of the ancient Chinese hierarchy comprised of government officials, peasants, workers and merchants) make a living. This essay adopts the latter.

Jianghu embodies an alternate space with loose organization and its own hierarchy and rules. As an industry for which it would be difficult to obtain a firm definition, contemporary art in China had a sphere of influence which is a
jianghu.

The geography of Chinese contemporary art depicts in a spatial form the simultaneity of the society and the map of power among producers and participants in the industry.
It is too imprudent to equate jianghu of Chinese contemporary art with resistance against the capitalist apparatus and Empire, as the relationship between jianghu and Empire should not be reduced to a simple dualism. Yet it is
even worse to think that they are equivalent. The two sometimes overlap: sometimesjianghuis the Lacanian symptom of Empire; sometimes jianghuis the metaphorical surplus of Empire.Despite the uncertainty, what can
be sure is that the two concepts are among the factors that determine the legitimacy of Chinese contemporary art.

Outline:

• “Empire" and "China": Concept of Empire and Chinese Contemporary Art in an International
Horizon
◦ This part investigates how the Empire concept is applied to the art mechanism and how the
concept molds the signifier “China art.” Under the mechanism of Empire, the independence of
China as a nation-state is weakened, and Chinese contemporary art is transformed to a noun
floating in the chain of signifiers, always drifting on its relative positions.

• Chinese Contemporary Art and the Concept ofjianghu
◦ This part investigates the history of jianghuas a concept in Chinese contemporary art and how
the participants in the scene interact with this cultural topography when transcending physical
geography.

• Interaction Between Empire and Jianghu in Chinese Contemporary Art
◦ Comparing the structure and symbolic networks in Chinese contemporary art under the
concepts of Empire and jianghu
◦ The influence on art production by the epistemology engendered by the suspension of physical
geography by Empire and jianghu
◦ Point de Capiton: This is the part probing into the overlapping and dislocation of Empire and
jianghuin the context contemporary art in globalization, with a focus on the expansion of
jianghuof Chinese contemporary art beyond the previous nation-state-geography boundaries
through globalization.
◦ The Name of the Other: Investigating the positions of Chinese galleries and artists in
international art events: Venice Biennial, Documenta and Art Basel, with a reference to concept
of "outsider" which Derrida mentioned inOf Hospitality.
◦ Who is whose symptom: The subjectivity between Empire andJiang Hu, and how it works on
art
◦ Biopolitics:jianghunever exists without people; Empire obtains its legitimacy from its
"multitudes"; this section analyzes how the politics between the people differ in the context of
jianghuand Empire
• Treading onJianghuand Striding through the Empire:Case Studies on Artists' Productionofa
Nation in a Nation/ Carrying the Tao to the West:Chinese
◦ Writing about the pioneers who made Chinese artist in an international horizon
◦ Artists: Cai Guoqiang, Huang Yongping, Xu Bing
• South to the Border:the "Southern" Artists in Cultural Geography
◦ Investigating how the “southerness” of the artists are produced injianghuand Empire.
◦ Artists: Chu Yun, Jiang Zhi, Liu Chuang, Zheng Guogu
• The World is the Corner: "International" / Non-Place Artist
◦ Focusing on how the Chinese artists who are considered to be international due to their
distance from conventional Chinese icons
◦ Artists: Cao Fei (early work), Adrian Wong, Xu Zhen

The outline for my book (that will not be published) , Chinese Version

(請勿轉載)

江湖與帝國：中國當代藝術的文化地理
by Venus Lau

Edward W. Soja 在Postmodern Geographies 提到19世紀人們對時間的迷戀：時間被認為是豐饒而辯證的，與之相反，空間卻是“死實，固定，非辯證和不變”的客體。時間主導的觀點在知識生產和批判理論上表現為對歷史的迷戀和對地理的投閒置散。縱使如褔柯之流的學術明星對這種一廂情願作出質疑，批判理論和文化研究界對歷史的迷戀仍未全面減退。此點在當代藝術表現為對美術史的狂熱。縱使有部份學者試圖探索（中國）當代藝術文化地理，結果卻是藝術典型化，或者文化地理被吸收為藝術史的一部分。本文將以“帝國”和“江湖”這兩個建基於空間性的概念，探索中國當代藝術。

內格里(Antonio Negri)和哈特(Michael Hardt)的著作帝國描述全球化語境下“帝國”主權的虛擬版圖。（帝國作者對馬克思主義的引用，難免會有歷史主義的意味，但是其帝國概念的空間性可作為思考的內在性平面Plane of immanence）資本作為“癌變無器官身體(cancerous body-without-organs)”，不斷複製自身的樣式，產生超越民族國家的要求。資本加速流通生產更多資本，民族國家的獨立性則日趨薄弱，它們連同其他超國家組織被資本制度編收；在單一，共享的邏輯下，築造了全新的主權形式 — 帝國。另一方面，信息科技的發達縮短甚至取消了物理距離，使帝國主權的影響力日益擴大，個體包括藝術只能被動地受其包攬，如醫學符號被刻寫在身體上，故帝國對目前中國當代藝術的生產和身份認同有密切的關系。

另一個與中國當代藝術無法分開的文化地理概念是“江湖”。江湖原本為江水湖泊總稱，后演變成隐士避世之處，亦指“游民”謀生的環境（本文取后者）。江湖是一“另類宇宙”，也是官方/傳統宗法制度的例外。江湖結構鬆散卻又具有自己的等級結構和规则，是“游民”浪蕩的世界。藝術作為難以定義的生產業，其有效範圍一如古時中國“四民”語境之外的江湖。中國當代藝術的江湖地理，以空間化形式，揭示現今社會的共時性(simultaneity)，也展示藝術生產者之間的的權力地圖。

草草把江湖當成藝術對資本机器和“帝國”的反抗未免天真 — 二者的關係不可化約為簡單的二元對立 — 把二者等同卻更大錯特錯。帝國和江湖范圍偶有重疊，江湖時而是帝國的徵兆，又可以是帝國的隱喻剩餘(metaphorical surplus)。。。但可以肯定二者是中國當代藝術合法性的組成部分。

結構：

“帝國”和“中國”：國際視野里的中國當代藝術
－中國當代藝術里的“中國”是一個能指鏈裡的名詞，經常游移在相對的位置，此部分采用帝國概念探討“中國當代藝術”此能指的歷史

江湖概念和中國當代藝術
－探討江湖作為當代藝術文化地形學的歷史，江湖如何與藝術生產者越過傳統地緣政治互動

帝國和江湖在中國當代藝術的共同作用
－探討在帝國和江湖的概念下中國當代藝術的符號網絡和結構
－帝國和江湖懸置物質地理對藝術帶來的影響
－Point de Capiton：研究中國當代藝術江湖和帝國的重疊和錯位
，并集中討論當代藝術江湖如何通過全球化超越昔日的民族國家 -地理局限
－"他者之名"：以德里达論好客的“外人”概念，看中國藝術在國際藝術事件 — 威尼斯雙年展/文獻展/巴塞爾 — 的位置
－誰是誰的征兆：探討中國當代藝術“帝國”和“江湖”的的主體間性(intersubjectivity)
－生命政治：江湖無人不立，帝國需要不斷尋求人的認受。此部分探討江湖和帝國語境下中國當代藝術的生命政治(biopolitics)

涉足江湖，通行帝國：藝術家個案研究

生產國中之國：“中國藝術家們”（蔡国强，黃永砯，徐冰）

討論把“中國當代藝術家”概念帶到國際視野的中國藝術先行者

“國境之南”： 文化地理中的“南方”藝術家 （儲云，蔣志，劉窗，鄭國谷）
探索文化地理產生的“南方性”

“世界就是角落”：“國際”／“非空間”藝術家 （曹斐，Adrian Wong，徐震）
討論與“中國符號”有所距離的國際藝術家

On Rirkrit

(published by art-ba-ba.com)



Rirkrit Tiravanija 的首個中國展覽“別干了”在唐人畫廊舉行。主要作品“无题2010（14086）”: 一個迷你磚窯，工人在微溼的磚胎上印上“別干了”和編號，燒製的14086塊磚以单价三十元人民幣供觀眾認購。新聞稿說14086等同築造一所簡易房子的磚塊數量。“无题2010（北京市朝阳区建国门外大街一号，上海市普陀区中山北路二十五号）”展示扎作成中國地標大樓形状的鸟笼，裏面进驻小鹦鹉等鸟类。藝術家参照画廊老板座驾制作的实物大石膏雕塑“无题2010（奶粉奔驰）”，上面铺了一层奶粉。“无题2010 （豆腐脑）”的豆腐腦攤及时消解北京冬天干硬的寒冷，工人忙着盛豆腐脑炸油条，虽然没有Rirkrit亲自下厨的泰式青咖哩和炒河粉，观/嚐者還是非常关照这“小吃摊”。


Rirkrit Tiravanija,泰國人生于布尔诺思艾利斯，居于纽约，柏林，曼谷，在不同国家举办展覽，在各地藝術節獲奬。這樣的藝術家不需要刻意经營，就已经够“国际”（他的 passport作品很好的体现了这一点）。除了少數家乡美食，Rirkrit鲜有宣传其家鄉文化符号。所以這次展覽符号之充溢叫人驚訝。這些符號並非產自泰国，而是现代中国：奔驰，奶粉，中国地标建筑，豆腐脑等，都是談論（尤其在討論發展的代價時）中國飛速發展經濟時避免不了的能指。Rirkrit在座谈会，新闻稿和杂志访谈中，早已表示展覽是对中国國家發展的回应。展覽把中国符号反饋中国，例如以奶粉把中國食品業醜聞和作為金錢象徵的奔馳融合在作品裡。或者邀請在中國一直作為底層人（subaltern）的磚窯工人參與藝術生產。這種反饋仿佛藝術家2008年作品 “无题2008：鉻就是未来” - 一張镜面乒乓球桌。

在Art Info 的访问里，Rirkrit好几次提到“超生产”（hyper production），这个辭彙暗示了速度和超越。人類的歷史就是速度的歷史，不管是資訊，武器，醫藥，商品，当掌握了速度，基本上就抓住世界，不妨在此引用Virilio 的一句名言，“光速不单改變世界，它變成了世界”。艺术家面对高速生产的中國社会，使用了反面的敘事－减速甚至靜止－娓娓道來无止境增长的资本：口号式的“不干了”，工人以竹篾慢慢扎作的高大鸟笼，代表富裕和速度的奔驰轿车－文化意蕴被抽出，功能性被剥夺，在展厅里拖着自己沉重的肉身，跟以艺术家对自己砖头作品的解说“把概念视觉化”互相观照。

评论Rirkrit的看客不少着眼于其跟食物有关的作品，例如著名的“无题 1992 （免费）”（1992） 和“社会布丁角” （2004），老實說公眾的参与和作為事件的作品本身，才是這些“藝術盛宴”的精要。Bourriaud 早在展覽Traffic（1996）的畫冊首次提到关系美學，闡述一種以社會語境的人際關係為出發點的新藝術。作為Traffic的参展艺术家藝術家之一，Rirkrit 的即場生產－消耗－再生產的藝術生产模式，为关系美學提供一個重要案例。關係美學概念的产生和当时互联网的兴起有关，新的溝通和建立社會關係的方式，促使人们重新梳理社会关系的可能性。关系藝術後來發展成涉及公眾參與的藝術的代名詞，不少人依照这个思路草草概括有关作品。十多年後的今天，當Apple IIc已經演變成iPhone和Macbook Pro，當你已經可以在家裡對著电脑购物，建立人際網絡的重大轉變，使我們需要重新审视关系藝術的概念。我認為Rirkrit的豆腐腦攤依然屬於關係美學的範疇，但這種想法沒有給我答案，反而給出更多問題：關係美學的關係是甚麼与什么的關係？是怎樣產生的關係？是為了誰產生的關係？藝術家是不是一句 “”社會責任”就可以和公眾接軌？到底誰是公眾？以hyperlink放射形式攝受資訊的人們，如何看待自己在這個公共活動的位置？關係美學能否向公眾示範更好的社會協作方式？現今觀眾對公眾參與的藝術作品駕輕就熟，藝術展覽的強勢的語境令關係美學有機會墮進“畫廊派對”的危險，我們怎樣重新在這樣的語境中重新成為公眾？Rirkrit的這個展覽不能回答以上問題，唯有希望藝術家和公眾的關係，不會像這次鳥籠作品的婉轉的鳥音那樣，只在畫廊裡生效。

说到吃这个題目，讓人想起Rirkrit的另外一件作品“Fear eats the soul”（“恐惧吞噬灵魂”），作品名稱來自德國導演法斯賓德 （Rainer Werner Fassbinder）1974年执导作品，該電影内容围绕一对忘年恋男女的爱情。電影說甚麼其實不重要，但是Rirkrit這個作品標題的eat－這個簡單辭彙無比赤裸，發音時的咬牙切齒，提醒人們遠古人類社會關係的起源其實為了填飽肚子。此論調和已經發展為文化學科的飲食，還有Rirkrit這種通過食物來進行社交的儀式性质，誠然相映成趣。

畫廊展廳與豆腐腦攤的陌生組合帶來的錯置感，加上展覽名稱的點題，不難使觀者把這次展覽與Guy Debord的奇觀社會（The Society of the Spectacle）聯繫起來。Debord的奇观理論是評論資本主義時被頻繁引用的思想，說明集中和彌散兩種奇觀(這次展覽是兩者的混合)。奇觀以林林總總的形態出現，不同的奇觀，不管背後運作的是甚麼（政治，文化，商業。。。）架構，都有一個共同點，需要注視。奇觀對注視的渴求，使其喜新厭舊，不斷被自己新的面目取代。展場裡繃蹦跳的小鳥和參與豆腐腦攤，拉長了觀眾注視的時間，在觀眾的心理地理上落了戶，帶來的是分神和反記憶。

Rirkrit以往作品大部份命名為“無題”(Untitled)，後面往往附上一個副標題，以括號圈住。此舉貌似以通過放棄命名，暗示藝術家要退下造物主的位置，另一方面卻又有點像香港人說的“唔（注：廣東話，“不”的意思）嫁又嫁” 。這樣的括號是迴避的姿勢 （但是迴避並不是否定），比如說1999年的作品“無題（明天閉嘴滾開）”。Rirkrit命名的迂迴猶如德里達談到的避免（Vermeiden），也像在"On Spirit"（“論靈魂”） 開首的“I shall speak of ghost, of flame, and of ashes" 一樣，在有限的音素裡，除了火和灰，燃燒的背後，煙霧蜿蜒。迴避，其實就是不可迴避本身。奇怪的是，此次中國展覽的題雖然還是沿用無題加括號的標題格式，副標題的內容卻清楚明了，“豆腐腦”，“奶粉奔馳”等跟作品的聯繫非常直白，這種處理，使這次展出的作品與以往相比，少了一些睿智。

本来可以用更多的理论来切割出这次展覽的各個稜面，可惜展覽裡某些露白的“中国印象”，使作品的闡釋可能性在在剥削-资本主义-过度生产-过度消费这样的圈子里打转。不要誤會，我没有要求Rirkrit说一口京片子喝豆汁，也没有想过什么“展示真实的中国”之類的幻覺，如果這是 Rirkrit要說的中國，我尊重他的看法。中國一如其他能指，對應不同人心裡的概念，每個人都有自己的中國，正如我的紅跟你的紅不一樣。縱使Rirkrit這次展覽像本Lonely Planet導遊書，卻正正揭示了我們都是活在自己的寂寞星球，Negri式帝國時代的國家－撫摸著自己的模糊的地理邊界－只是全球化經濟下的又一件產品。

Meeting Gary Snyder

Great to meet one of the members of Beat Generation, although he refused the label of "Beat writers".
I am not a big fan of Snyder, yet I appreciate his insistence on Zen's ineffability - which makes the Koan of a monk got his finger cut make sense -and I am happy to know that there is another Noh fan.

Badiou; 15 Theses on Contemporary Art

(From Lacan.com)
I think everybody has the 15 theses, it is necessary, I think, for the talk. I'll comment about the theses and you can read them. I think the great question about contemporary art is how not to be Romantic. It's the great question and a very difficult one. More precisely, the question is how not to be a formalist-Romantic. Something like a mixture between Romanticism and formalism. On one side is the absolute desire for new forms, always new forms, something like an infinite desire. Modernity is the infinite desire of new forms. But, on the other side, is obsession with the body, with finitude, sex, cruelty, death. The contradiction of the tension between the obsession of new forms and the obsession of finitude, body, cruelty, suffering and death is something like a synthesis between formalism and Romanticism and it is the dominant current in contemporary art. All the 15 theses have as a sort of goal, the question how not to be formalist-Romantic. That is, in my opinion, the question of contemporary art.

Lombardi is really a good example, and I am very glad to speak here tonight. We can see that there is something like a demonstration, a connection, points of connections. You have something very surprising, because Lombardi knew all that before the facts. We have somewhere, a great drawing about the Bush dynasty which is really prophetic, which is an artistic prophecy, that is a creation of a new knowledge, and so it's really surprising to see that after the facts. And it's really the capacity, the ability of art to present something before the facts, before the evidence. And it's something calm and elevated, like a star. You know, it's like a galaxy, see, it's something like the galaxy of corruption. So, the three determinations are really in the works of Lombardi. And so it's the creation of a new possibility of art and a new vision of the world, our world. But a new vision which is not purely conceptual, ideological or political, a new vision which has it's proper shape, which creates a new artistic possibility, something which is new knowledge of the world has a new shape, like that. It's really an illustration of my talk.



The first thesis: Art is not the sublime descent of the infinite into the finite abjection of the body and sexuality. It is the production of an infinite subjective series through the finite means of a material subtraction.

This is an intimation of how not to be a Romantic. It consists of the production of a new infinite content, of a new light. I think it’s the very aim of art; producing a new light about the world by means of precise and finite summarization. So, you have to change the contradiction. The contradiction today is between the infinity of the desire for new forms and the finitude of the body, of the sexuality, and so on. And new art needs to change the terms of this contradiction and put on the side of infinity new content, new light, a new vision of the world, and on the side of finitude, the precision of means and of summarization. So, the first thesis is something like the reversal of the contradiction.

Subtraction: the word subtraction has two meanings. First, not to be obsessed with formal novelty. I think it’s a great question today because the desire for novelty is the desire of new forms, an infinite desire for new form. The obsession of new forms, the artistic obsession with novelty, of critique, of representation and so on, is really not a critical position about capitalism because capitalism itself is the obsession of novelty and the perpetual renovation of forms. You have a computer, but the following year it’s not the true computer, you need a new one. You have a car, but the coming year it’s an old car, something like an old thing and so on. So, it’s a necessity for us to see that the complete obsession with new forms is not really a critical position about the world as it is. It’s a possibility that the real desire, which is subversive desire, is the desire of eternity. The desire for something which is a stability, something which is art, something which is closed in-itself. I don’t think it’s quite like that, but it’s a possibility because the perpetual modification of forms is not really a critical position, so the desire of new forms is certainly something important in art, but the desire for the stability of forms is also something important. And, I think we have to examine the question today.

The second meaning of subtraction is not to be obsessed with finitude, with cruelty, body, suffering, with sex and death, because it’s only the reversal of the ideology of happiness. In our world there is something like an ideology of happiness. Be happy and enjoy your life and so on. In artistic creation we often have the reversal of that sort of ideology in the obsession with suffering bodies, the difficulty of sexuality, and so on. We need not be in that sort of obsession. Naturally a critical position about the ideology of happiness is an artistic necessity, but it’s also an artistic necessity to see it as a new vision, a new light, something like a positive new world. And so, the question of art is also the question of life and not always the question of death. It is a signification of the first thesis; we have to search for an artistic creation which is not obsessed with formal novelty, with cruelty, death, body, and sexuality.

Second thesis: Art cannot merely be the expression of a particularity (be it ethnic or personal). Art is the impersonal production of a truth that is addressed to everyone.

The great question here is a question of universality: is there, or is there not, a universality of artistic creation? Because the great question today is the question of globalization, the question of the unity of the world. Globalization proposes to us an abstract universality. A universality of money, the universality of communication and the universality of power. That is the universalism today. And so, against the abstract universality of money and of power, what is the question of art, what is the function of artistic creation? Is the function of artistic creation to oppose, to abstract from universality only a singularity of particularities, something like being against the abstraction of money and of power, or as a community against globalization and so on? Or, is the function of art to propose another kind of universality? That’s a big question. The more important issue today is the main contradiction between capitalistic universality on one hand, universality of the market if you want, of money and power and so on, and singularities, particularities, the self of the community. It’s the principal contradiction between two kinds of universalities. On one side the abstract universality of money and power, and on the other the concrete universality of truth and creation. My position is that artistic creation today should suggest a new universality, not to express only the self or the community, but that it’s a necessity for the artistic creation to propose to us, to humanity in general, a new sort of universality, and my name for that is truth. Truth is only the philosophical name for a new universality against the forced universality of globalization, the forced universality of money and power, and in that sort of proposition, the question of art is a very important question because art is always a proposition about a new universality, and art is a signification of the second thesis.

Third thesis. It’s only a definition of the universality of art. What is an artistic truth? Artistic truth is different from scientific truth, from political truth, from other sorts of truths. The definition is that artistic truth is always a truth about the sensible, an outline of the sensual. It’s not a static sensible expression. An artistic truth is not a copy of the sensible world nor a static sensible expression. My definition is that an artistic truth is a happening of l’Idèe in the sensible itself. And, the new universality of art is the creation of a new form of happening of the Idea in the sensible as such. It’s very important to understand that an artistic truth is a proposition about the sensible in the world. It’s a proposition about a new definition of what is our sensible relation to the world, which is a possibility of universality against the abstraction of money and power. So, if art seems very important today, it is because globalization imposes to us the creation of a new kind of universality, which is always a new sensibility and a new sensible relation to the world. And because the oppression today is the oppression of abstract universality, we have to think of art along the direction of the new sensible relation to the world. And so, today, artistic creation is a part of human emancipation, it’s not an ornament, a decoration and so on. No, the question of art is a central question, and it’s central because we have to create a new sensible relation to the world. In fact, without art, without artistic creation, the triumph of the forced universality of money and power is a real possibility. So the question of art today is a question of political emancipation, there is something political in art itself. There is not only a question of art’s political orientation, like it was the case yesterday, today it is a question in itself. Because art is a real possibility to create something new against the abstract universality that is globalization.

Fourth thesis. This thesis is against the dream of totalization. Some artists today are thinking that there is a possibility to fuse all the artistic forms, it’s the dream of a complete multimedia. But it’s not a new idea. As you probably know, it was the idea of Richard Wagner, the total art, with pictures, music, poetry and so on. So the first multimedia artist was Richard Wagner. And, I think multimedia is a false idea because it’s the power of absolute integration and it’s something like the projection in art of the dream of globalization. It’s a question of the unity of art like the unity of the world but it’s an abstraction too. So, we need to create new art, certainly new forms, but not with the dream of a totalization of all the forms of sensibility. It’s a great question to have a relation to multimedia and to new forms of images, of art, which is not the paradigm of totalization. So we have to be free about that sort of dream.

A few words about theses five and eight. The question here is what exactly is the creation of new forms. It’s very important because of what I previously said about the infinite desire for new forms being a problem in contemporary art. We have to be precise about the question of new forms in themselves. What is the creation of new forms? I hint that, in fact, there is never exactly pure creation of new forms. I think it’s a dream, like totalization, pure creation of absolute new forms. In fact, there is always something like a passage of something which is not exactly a form to something that is a form, and I argue that we have something like impurity of forms, or impure forms, and purification. So, in art there is not exactly pure creation of forms, God created the world, if you want, but there is something like progressive purification, and complexification of forms in sequence. Two examples if you wish. When Malevich paints the famous white on white, the white square on white square. Is that the creation of something? In one sense yes, but in fact, it’s the complete purification of the problem of the relation between shape and color. In fact, the problem of the relation between shape and color is an old one with a long story and in Malevich’s white square on white square, we have an ultimate purification of the story of the problem and also it’s a creation, but it’s also the end, because after white square on white square there is, in one sense, nothing, we cannot continue. So we have a complete purification and after Malevich all correlation between shape and color looks old, or impure, but it’s also the end of the question, and we have to begin with something else. We may say that with artistic creation, it’s not exactly the pure creation of new forms, something like the process of purification with beginnings and with ends too. So, we have sequences of purification, much more than pure rupture of pure creation. And it’s the content of theses five and eight.

We come now to theses six and seven. The question here is what exactly is the subjective existence of art? What is the subject in art, the subject in the subjective sense? It’s a great discussion, a very old one. What is the subject in art? What is the agent of art? The subject in art is not the artist. It’s an old thesis too, but an important one. So, if you think that the real subject in artist creation is the artist, you are positing the artistic creation as the expression of somebody. If the artist is the subject, art is the expression of that subject, thereby art is something like a personal expression. In fact, it is necessary for contemporary art to argue the case that art is a personal expression, because you have no possibility to create a new form of universality and you oppose to the abstract form of universality only the expression of the self or the expression of communities. So, you understand the link between the different problems. It’s imperative for us to say that the subject in artistic creation is not the artist as such. “Artist” is a necessity for art, but not a subjective necessity. So, the conclusion is quite simple. The subjective existence of art are the works of art, and nothing else. The artist is not the subjective agent of art. The artist is the sacrificial part of art. It’s also, finally, what disappears in art. And the ethic of art is to accept the disappearance. Sometimes the artist is someone who wants to appear, but it’s not a good thing for art. For art, if you want art to have today the very important function of the creation of a new universality, if you think that art is something like a subjective expression for the market, it’s necessary that the artist make a great appearance, naturally, but if art is the creation, the secret creation, something like that, if art is not something of the market, but is something against the force of universality of the market, the consequence is that the artist must disappear, and not to be someone who appears in the media and so on. And a critique of art is something like a critique of something like desperation. If the ethic of art is something like desperation, it is because what show are works of art, which are the real subjective existence of art in-itself.

It’s also the same thing in thesis nine. I don’t comment The question of the ethic of art is not to be imperial. Desperation because operation is always something like imperial operation, because the law of operation is today imperial law.

About theses ten and eleven, I think we can demonstrate that imperial art is the name for what is visible today. Imperial art is exactly Romantic-formalism. That is a historical thesis, or a political thesis if you want. The mixture of Romanticism and formalism is exactly the imperial art. Not only today, but, for example, during the Roman Empire too. There is something common between the situation today and the situation at the end of the Roman Empire. It’s a good comparison, you see, and more precisely between the United States and the Roman Empire. There is really something very interesting with that sort of comparison, and in fact the question is also a question of artistic creation, because by the end of the Roman Empire we have exactly two dispositions in artistic creation. On one side, something really Romantic, expressive, violent, and on the other, something extremely formalist, politically straight. Why? When we deal with the situation of something like an empire, something like having the formal unity of the world, if you want, it’s not only the United States, it’s finally the big markets, when we have something like a potential unity of the world, we have in artistic creation something like formalism and Romanticism, a mixture of the two. Why? Because when we have an empire, we have two principles. First, all is possible because we have a big potency, a unity of the world. So we may say, all is possible. We may create new forms, we may speak of everything, there is not really laws about what is possible, what is not possible, so everything is possible. Yet, we also have another maxim, everything is impossible, because there is nothing else to have, the empire is the only possible existence, the only political possibility. So, you can say that everything is possible and you can say that everything is impossible, and when the two are said you have an artistic creation, formalism, that is to say all is possible, new forms are always possible, and Romanticism and nihilism because all is impossible, and finally, we have the mixture of the two, and contemporary art is saying that all is possible and that all is impossible. The impossibility of possibility and the possibility of impossibility. That is the real content of contemporary art. To escape that sort of situation is to state that something is possible, not all is possible, not all is impossible, but something else is possible. There is a possibility of something else. So, we have to create a new possibility. But to create a new possibility is not the same thing as to realize a new possibility. It’s a very fundamental distinction, to realize a possibility is to think that the possibility is here and I need to conceive the possibility. For example, if all is possible, I have to realize something, because all things are possible, but, naturally, it’s quite a different thing to create something possible. The possibility is not here. So, it is not true, that all is possible, some things are not possible, and you have to create the possibility of that thing which is not possible. And it is the great question of artistic creation. Is artistic creation the realization of a possibility or is artistic creation the creation of a new possibility? The possibility of something, the possibility of saying something is possible. If you think all is possible (that is the same as to think all is impossible), your conviction in the world is finished, the world is something closed. It is closed with all the possibilities, which is the same thing that everything are impossibilities and artistic creation is closed too, it’s closed in formalist-Romanticism which is the affirmation that all is possible and all is impossible. But the true function of artistic creation today is the possibility of saying that something is possible, so to create a new possibility. But where can we create a new possibility when something is impossible? Because we can create a new possibility when something is not a possibility. If all is possible, you cannot create a new possibility. So, the question of a new possibility is also the question of something impossible, so we have to assume that it’s not true that all is possible, that also it’s not true that all is impossible, we have to say something is impossible where something is impossible. I have to create a new possibility. And, I think the creation of new possibility is today the great function of art. In other activities of circulation, communication, the market and so on, we have always the realization of possibilities, infinite realization of possibilities. But not creation of possibility. And so it’s also a political question, because politics truly means the creation of a new possibility. A new possibility of life, a new possibility of the world. And so the political determination of artistic creation is today whether it is possible, or impossible to create a new possibility. Actually, globalization carries the conviction that it is utterly impossible to create a new possibility. And the end of Communism, and the end of revolutionary politics is, in fact, the dominant interpretation of that all: it is impossible to create a new possibility. Not to realize a possibility, but to create a new possibility. You understand the difference. And I think the question of artistic creation lies here. It proves for everybody, for humanity in general, that it is a possibility to create a new possibility.

About thesis twelve. It’s a poetic thesis. The three determinations of artistic creation, to compare artistic creation with a demonstration, with an ambush in the night and with a star. You can understand the three determinations. Why a demonstration? Because finally the question of artistic creation is also the question of something odd, something possessing a sort of eternity, something which is not in pure communication, pure circulation, something which is not in the constant modification of forms. Something which resists and resistance is a question of art also today. Something which resists is something endowed with some stability, solid. Something which is a logical equation, which has a logical coherence, consistence, is the first determination. The second determination is something surprising, something which is right away the creation of a new possibility, but a new possibility is always surprising. We cannot have a new possibility without some sort of surprise. A new possibility is something that we cannot calculate. It’s something like a rupture, a new beginning, which is always something surprising. Thus, the second determination. And it’s marvelous, like something in the night, the night of our knowledge. A new possibility is something absolutely new for our knowledge, so it’s the night of our knowledge. Something like a new light. Elevated as a star because a new possibility is something like a new star. Something like a new planet, a new world, because it is a new possibility. Something like a new sensible relation to the world. But the great problem lies elsewhere. The formal problem for contemporary art is not the determination, one by one. The problem is how to relate the three. To be the star, the ambush, and the demonstration. Something like that. And Lombardi is really a good example, and I am very glad to speak here tonight. We can see that there is something like a demonstration, a connection, points of connections. You have something very surprising, because Lombardi knew all that before the facts. We have somewhere, a great drawing about the Bush dynasty which is really prophetic, which is an artistic prophecy, that is a creation of a new knowledge, and so it’s really surprising to see that after the facts. And it’s really the capacity, the ability of art to present something before the facts, before the evidence. And it’s something calm and elevated, like a star. You know, it’s like a galaxy, see, it’s something like the galaxy of corruption. So, the three determinations are really in the works of Lombardi. And so it’s the creation of a new possibility of art and a new vision of the world, our world. But a new vision which is not purely conceptual, ideological or political, a new vision which has it’s proper shape, which creates a new artistic possibility, something which is new knowledge of the world has a new shape, like that. It’s really an illustration of my talk.

The last thesis. I think the great question is the correlation between art and humanity. More precisely the correlation between artistic creation and liberty. Is artistic creation something independent in the democratic sense of freedom? I think if you consider Lombardi for a second time, we may consider the issue of creating a new possibility as not exactly a question of freedom, in the common sense, because there is an imperial definition of freedom today, which is the common democratic definition. Is artistic creation something like that sort of freedom? I think not. I think the real determination of artistic creation is not the common sense of freedom, the imperial sense of freedom. It’s a creation of a new form of liberty, a new form of freedom. And we may see here that sort of thing because the connection between the logical framework, the surprise of new knowledge, and the beauty of the star is a definition of freedom which is much more complex than the democratic determination of freedom.

I think of artistic creation as the creation of a new kind of liberty which is beyond the democratic definition of liberty. And we may speak of something like an artistic definition of liberty which is intellectual and material, something like Communism within a logical framework, because there is no liberty without logical framework, something like a new beginning, a new possibility, rupture, and finally something like a new world, a new light, a new galaxy. This is the artistic definition of liberty and the issue today consists not in an art discussion between liberty and dictatorship, between liberty and oppression, but in my opinion, between two definitions of liberty itself.

The artistic question of the body in some art forms, like cinema or dance, is precisely the question of the body within the body and not the body without body. It is an idealistic conception of the body without the body or the body as something else, crucial in the story of Christianity and in Paul. For example in the Greek classical painting the body is always something else than the body, and if you consider something like the body in Tintoretto, for example, the body is something like movement which is body like something else than the body. But in fact today the body has a body, the body in the body is the body as such. And the body as such is something very hard, because the body has no representation which is really a representation as a star, something like that. In that sort of painting (Lombardi), we have names, and no bodies. It is a substitution of names to bodies. We have no picture of Bin Laden, but the name of Bin Laden. We have no picture of Bush, but the name of Bush. Father and sons.

Zizek: 20 Years of Collapse

20 Years of Collapse

By SLAVOJ ZIZEK

TODAY is the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. During this time of reflection, it is common to emphasize the miraculous nature of the events that began that day: a dream seemed to come true, the Communist regimes collapsed like a house of cards, and the world suddenly changed in ways that had been inconceivable only a few months earlier. Who in Poland could ever have imagined free elections with Lech Walesa as president?

However, when the sublime mist of the velvet revolutions was dispelled by the new democratic-capitalist reality, people reacted with an unavoidable disappointment that manifested itself, in turn, as nostalgia for the “good old” Communist times; as rightist, nationalist populism; and as renewed, belated anti-Communist paranoia.

The first two reactions are easy to comprehend. The same rightists who decades ago were shouting, “Better dead than red!” are now often heard mumbling, “Better red than eating hamburgers.” But the Communist nostalgia should not be taken too seriously: far from expressing an actual wish to return to the gray Socialist reality, it is more a form of mourning, of gently getting rid of the past. As for the rise of the rightist populism, it is not an Eastern European specialty, but a common feature of all countries caught in the vortex of globalization.

Much more interesting is the recent resurgence of anti-Communism from Hungary to Slovenia. During the autumn of 2006, large protests against the ruling Socialist Party paralyzed Hungary for weeks. Protesters linked the country’s economic crisis to its rule by successors of the Communist party. They denied the very legitimacy of the government, although it came to power through democratic elections. When the police went in to restore civil order, comparisons were drawn with the Soviet Army crushing the 1956 anti-Communist rebellion.

This new anti-Communist scare even goes after symbols. In June 2008, Lithuania passed a law prohibiting the public display of Communist images like the hammer and sickle, as well as the playing of the Soviet anthem. In April 2009, the Polish government proposed expanding a ban on totalitarian propaganda to include Communist books, clothing and other items: one could even be arrested for wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt.

No wonder that, in Slovenia, the main reproach of the populist right to the left is that it is the “force of continuity” with the old Communist regime. In such a suffocating atmosphere, new problems and challenges are reduced to the repetition of old struggles, up to the absurd claim (which sometimes arises in Poland and in Slovenia) that the advocacy of gay rights and legal abortion is part of a dark Communist plot to demoralize the nation.

Where does this resurrection of anti-Communism draw its strength from? Why were the old ghosts resuscitated in nations where many young people don’t even remember the Communist times? The new anti-Communism provides a simple answer to the question: “If capitalism is really so much better than Socialism, why are our lives still miserable?”

It is because, many believe, we are not really in capitalism: we do not yet have true democracy but only its deceiving mask, the same dark forces still pull the threads of power, a narrow sect of former Communists disguised as new owners and managers — nothing’s really changed, so we need another purge, the revolution has to be repeated …

What these belated anti-Communists fail to realize is that the image they provide of their society comes uncannily close to the most abused traditional leftist image of capitalism: a society in which formal democracy merely conceals the reign of a wealthy minority. In other words, the newly born anti-Communists don’t get that what they are denouncing as perverted pseudo-capitalism simply is capitalism.

One can also argue that, when the Communist regimes collapsed, the disillusioned former Communists were effectively better suited to run the new capitalist economy than the populist dissidents. While the heroes of the anti-Communist protests continued to dwell in their dreams of a new society of justice, honesty and solidarity, the former Communists were able to ruthlessly accommodate themselves to the new capitalist rules and the new cruel world of market efficiency, inclusive of all the new and old dirty tricks and corruption.

A further twist is added by those countries in which Communists allowed the explosion of capitalism, while retaining political power: they seem to be more capitalist than the Western liberal capitalists themselves. In a crazy double reversal, capitalism won over Communism, but the price paid for this victory is that Communists are now beating capitalism in its own terrain.

This is why today’s China is so unsettling: capitalism has always seemed inextricably linked to democracy, and faced with the explosion of capitalism in the People’s Republic, many analysts still assume that political democracy will inevitably assert itself.

But what if this strain of authoritarian capitalism proves itself to be more efficient, more profitable, than our liberal capitalism? What if democracy is no longer the necessary and natural accompaniment of economic development, but its impediment?

If this is the case, then perhaps the disappointment at capitalism in the post-Communist countries should not be dismissed as a simple sign of the “immature” expectations of the people who didn’t possess a realistic image of capitalism.

When people protested Communist regimes in Eastern Europe, the large majority of them did not ask for capitalism. They wanted the freedom to live their lives outside state control, to come together and talk as they pleased; they wanted a life of simplicity and sincerity, liberated from the primitive ideological indoctrination and the prevailing cynical hypocrisy.

As many commentators observed, the ideals that led the protesters were to a large extent taken from the ruling Socialist ideology itself — people aspired to something that can most appropriately be designated as “Socialism with a human face.” Perhaps this attitude deserves a second chance.

This brings to mind the life and death of Victor Kravchenko, the Soviet engineer who, in 1944, defected during a trade mission to Washington and then wrote a best-selling memoir, “I Chose Freedom.” His first-person report on the horrors of Stalinism included a detailed account of the mass hunger in early-1930s Ukraine, where Kravchenko — then still a true believer in the system — helped enforce collectivization.

What most people know about Kravchenko ends in 1949. That year, he sued Les Lettres Françaises for libel after the French Communist weekly claimed that he was a drunk and a wife-beater and his memoir was the propaganda work of American spies. In the Paris courtroom, Soviet generals and Russian peasants took the witness stand to debate the truth of Kravchenko’s writings, and the trial grew from a personal suit to a spectacular indictment of the whole Stalinist system.

But immediately after his victory in the case, when Kravchenko was still being hailed all around the world as a cold war hero, he had the courage to speak out passionately against Joseph McCarthy’s witch hunts. “I believe profoundly,” he wrote, “that in the struggle against Communists and their organizations … we cannot and should not resort to the methods and forms employed by the Communists.” His warning to Americans: to fight Stalinism in such a way was to court the danger of starting to resemble their opponent.

Kravchenko also became more and more obsessed with the inequalities of the Western world, and wrote a sequel to “I Chose Freedom” that was titled, significantly, “I Chose Justice.” He devoted himself to finding less exploitative forms of collectivization and wound up in Bolivia, where he squandered all his money trying to organize poor farmers. Crushed by this failure, he withdrew into private life and shot himself in 1966 at his home in New York.

How did we come to this? Deceived by 20th-century Communism and disillusioned with 21st-century capitalism, we can only hope for new Kravchenkos — and that they come to happier ends. On the search for justice, they will have to start from scratch. They will have to invent their own ideologies. They will be denounced as dangerous utopians, but they alone will have awakened from the utopian dream that holds the rest of us under its sway.

Slavoj Zizek, the international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities in London, is the author, most recently, of “First as Tragedy, Then as Frace.

Terayama Shuji: Pastoral Hide-and-Seek

寺山修司的田园之死 (Pastoral Hide-and Seek, 1974, dir. Terayama Shuji)

By Venus Lau
《田园之死》 是寺山修司五部长片之一，是新手观其电影的入门课。片中华丽的视觉隐喻流溢，碎片般的情节，穿插期间的古怪人物（马戏团里的空气女，侏儒，全身披黑袈裟， 带海盗眼罩的白面老妇，硫磺味弥漫的恐山，化浓妆的小孩等），种种意象搭构出寺山修司的世界，跟寺山修司的整个电影系列组成庞大的风格化异色空间。

不少人看过《田园之死》后均认为其为寺山的自传体作品，除了以第一人称作为陈述角度外，戏中主角（以成人和少年两种姿态出现）与寺山修司同月同日生（同为12月10日，但寺山修司生于公元1935年，主角“我”出生年份则为昭和49年，即公元1974年，亦即该片拍摄年份）； 寺山修司在日本青森县出生，戏中主角的出生地是位于青森县，有日本三大灵场之称的恐山（电影里主角称自己的出生地－－恐山地处东京市）。种种非巧合的安排，证明寺山修司欲一借电影改写自己的历史而重生的意图。故此，解读此片的时候，不少人会堕入以作者生平为阐释作品的单一切入点的圈套，出色的电影随即代替作者经验（empirical）生活成为主线，不论是意难平或者有病呻吟，戏里的肆意的意象和诗意都沦为对作者来得太迟的抱怨的附庸。

艺术作品一如艺术家之儿。父母和子女的关系强调的是被伦理强化的，以脐带为象征的血缘关系。但是作品不是艺术家的附属，作品俨如离开子宫的幼儿，已然是独立个体，而不是父母共同投下的影子。电影是开放的，流动的文本，解读（虽然所有阐释都是误读）若然只取作者主导的方式，难免减损作品的价值－－作品的价值就是的每次阐释的内容，每一次解读赋予作品新的生命。我不否定寺山修司欲以〈田园之死〉来表现昔日屈服于母亲权威下迟熟的反抗，继而获得重生，但寺山修司的想法并不是诠释的唯一路标，而且这观点在云云有关寺山修司的评论已被多番提及，更有有心人以寺山修司生平对号入座，把电影各元素与寺山生平的经验事件等同，把寺山多彩诡奇的想像力拉低到生活牢骚的水平， 艺术里的直观成分亦被完全消去。


反抗权威的败北
寺山修司电 影里对权威的反抗极为明显，如在实验短片《番茄酱皇帝》里小童追杀成人，《再见方舟》近亲表兄妹不顾坚固的贞操带的阻隔，坚持尝试做爱，片中人物对权力象征权力实体的颠覆意图都非常明显。这些露白的反抗行动是寺山修司电影的重要课题。对权威的挑战在《死在田园》展示为弑母意识。主角想借对记忆的操控，让少 年时代的自己杀掉母亲，事与愿违，弑母计划最后失败。

弑母计划是对母亲此权力／权威象征和实体的挑战。权力是弥散的，是一种力量关系，权力并不是由在上者的创造，权力得以成就，有赖所有参与者（包括在下者）的共谋，而作为共谋者，在下者的权力就是作为社会共谋的权力；权力，需要两端的支撑。所以死在田园的主角弑母失败，不单因为受制与社会伦理的羁绊，而是自己还没有脱离作为权力共谋的脚色，主角一厢情愿地企图抹走权力实体或者象征带来的阴影，根本不能切断权力力量关系的纽带，反而越踩越深。这样的反抗一如萨德对神的亵渎，一切最后只是徒劳。

不少人认为弑母是一种“反俄狄浦斯”, 把寺山得作品一把跟法国哲学家德勒兹(Gilles Deleuze)联系起来。但是单单把主角身兼父职的母亲等同德勒兹以差异和生成(becoming)挑战being的游牧，似乎有有点太草率。俄狄浦斯情结作为主体进入象征界(the symbolic)的关键,也是主体建立和认同(identification)的关键，当中的关键词是弑父意图，继而带出父明(the name of father)。田园之死里的弑母意图，与其说是对传统主体概念的颠覆，倒不如说是对家庭结构的崩坏和重组。
寺山修司的时间
无论在寺山的电影，还是在他主持的《天栈屋敷》话剧团的作品里，时间的象征和隐喻无处不在：《再见方舟》内失去时间的村庄；舞台剧由真人扮演的巨钟，或者，，〈田园之死〉主角母亲收集的破钟堆。形形色色，表报不同时间的时钟，没有提醒人时间，相反，它们让人忘掉时间。时钟不但是象征，更是实际工具，令量化客观时间的统一结构可以复印在世界之上。 至少是人所认知的世界，之上。

客观时间是我们所熟悉的时间，三点半，美国比中慢，十三小时，一分钟等 同六十秒。。。。。这都是被普遍默认的，跟本真时间对立的派生概念。客观时间也是“时间对我们显现为各个当下，各个现在的次序” （1）这些现在可以在某写发 生事情的时段上被计数”，这种概念为时间的量化和一体化提供了可能性。相反，本真时间没有经过任何概念的干扰，是本原地向人展示的时间。本真时间就是我们 的此在，就是我们的主体性，那是真正的自我 （无意识？他者的语言？），而非透过线性时间里，拉康的镜象自我。

〈死在田园〉主角母亲尝试把自己的 儿子（少年时代的“我”）困在她的时间里，此举跟客观线性时间的霸权如出一辙。唯压力越大反抗越大，主角为古灵精怪的马戏团所吸引，决心逃离母亲，离开村 子过新生活，最后他阴差阳错失去了童贞。客观时间象征－－母亲的时钟堆－－渐渐远离的同时，少年手上多了一只象征本真时间的手表。比起弑母此类 对某一权力对象的颠覆，重新阐释时间， 并展示时间的伯格森式(Bergson)不可分割性并以此建立主体性是更为彻底的革命。

除了控制戏中人的时间，〈田园之死〉也操控观者的时间。电影开端小朋友玩躲猫猫，原本的小玩伴忽然变成大正年代打扮的诡异人物，电影结尾主角跟母亲在故乡家中，刹那间四面墙倒下，主角暴露与东京繁华的街头，还有电影中 空气女的呻吟，系在殉情男女身上的红线，鬼火般飘浮的日本老童谣。。。。。。这些感官异觉化（视觉和听觉上）不啻是寺山修司强烈风格特征，也是延长艾柯 （Umberto Eco)在〈优游小说林〉里述及的阅读（观看）时间的技巧。对于电影和书本里寻常的物事和情节，我们会用在现实中早已熟知的经验／取自经验的逻辑推断，加 快阅读时间。面对寺山修司精心布局的奇形怪状，既有逻辑无用武之地，观众只好费尽心神寻找当中的意蕴，或者象我那样，尽情享受日本cult 片鬼才预备的感官盛宴。如是者，观众所经验的时间不是放片的102 分钟，而是他们迷路的时间。


记忆的不可信性

在 阳光灿烂的日子（或原著《动物凶猛》）里，主角马小军越深入自己的记忆，就越发现处处出错，到后来甚至黑白不分，我们就知道记忆的不可信。记忆隐恶扬善，只保留对意识有利的叙述，甚至对你作出彻底背叛。《死在田园》的“我”以为可以驾驭记忆，并以这种自信武装自己回到故乡恐山。可惜，当他跟昔日年轻的自己开始对话，少年主角马上揭 露成年主角美化了过去，记忆本是一连串谎言。记忆就是这么不可靠。无奈的是，我们需要从记忆抽取经验来建立自我的主体性和应付生活上的决定，无法进入记忆和意识的，就是我们生活里的惊颤。

俳句
寺山是俳人，在〈田园之死〉里，俳句俯拾皆是，有人理解其所为是对美国强势文化的抗议。俳句的节奏是跟日本人的呼吸非常吻合的，再好的文笔，也只可以翻译俳句书面的意思，但不可能翻译俳句的呼吸。田园之死的俳句表示了艺术的直观成分，那些部分，一如禅言，同为不可说，不可说。我没有大道理，只是任何的解释读不及无法解释的呼吸，那么有趣。


田园之死的流程里，主角不断与权力短兵相接，不断重建主体性。那些我们永无完结的游戏。

寺山修司的重口味freak show 意向让不少人把他跟费里尼（Federico Fellini)连在一起,也有人说寺山修司象拍过Salo的柏索里尼（Pier Paolo Pasolini )，因为大家都有或隐晦或露白的性描写。 但，

寺山修司就是寺山修司，只能是寺山修司。
（1）胡塞尔与海德格尔的“本真”时间现象学，克劳斯·黑尔德