访谈丨溶解大师ZEVS

                
                
法国涂鸦艺术的先驱者以及代表艺术家的ZEVS以他标志性的“Liquidation”技巧而著名。
1990年代初期，在巴黎以tagger（用喷漆或马克所写的作者的签名/署名）进行活动，90年代中后期与 André and Invader进行合作并在法国街头艺术领域成为了至关重要的人物。90年代后期，通过在巴黎街头地铁站的入口、长椅、信号灯等公共设施上绘出影子轮廓的“Electric Shadow” 项目以及 “Visual Kidnapping”项目，一跃转变身份为艺术家。2000年代中期开始创作含有谷歌、香奈儿、可口可乐等世界品牌商标的“Liquidation Logos”的作品让他一举成名。
他是用卢浮宫馆藏作品《蒙娜丽莎》与品牌作过合作的唯一艺术家，并且被选定为2016世界气候大会的代表艺术家。
                
                
ZEVS的作品让人能联想到波普艺术与涂鸦艺术的精神相结合,强调着当代文化的本质内容。MoCA对ZEVS进行了一系列采访，我们来看看这位极具符号特色的艺术家是怎么回答的吧！
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MoCA君：你的“影子”系列与传统的涂鸦表达不尽相同，为什么会用这样的表达方式呢？
ZEVS: 这系列作品背后有两个想法：布塔得斯的故事是希腊神话中的一个经典，讲述的是绘画的起源来自于描绘影子。另一来源是马塞尔•杜尚现成品的想法，把城市作为“现成的”材料，我将两者结合并延伸，创作出该系列的作品。
这个作品的想法是为了让城市中容易被忽略的东西显眼可见。这个工作之前，我曾尝试过许多直白的作品表达，但对巴黎来说这些作品早已饱和了。因此我将视角转向更微妙的东西，像巴黎晚上电灯的影子，不太明显并且不是一个物体，常常被人们忽略，它是如此微妙，与城市最明显的标志比起来甚至是相反的。我把它们显现出来，在白天依然保持着巴黎夜晚的光照痕迹。
我在纽约和伦敦做这项工作，很多时候像是我在追踪一个无家可归的人的影子，而不是城市设施；他整天睡在同一个地方，所以几乎成为人们熟悉的风景，成为纽约的一部分，我看到了他几乎看不见的存在。在我的个展中，这系列作品与马奈的作品《喝苦艾酒的人》在同一个房间。
                
                
MoCA: Your "Electric Shadow" series is noticeably different from traditional expressions of graffiti, how did you come about such an expression？
                
                
ZEVS: There are two ideas behind this work. One is a classic Greek mythology of Butades, which tells about the act of tracing shadow as the origin of painting. The other is Marcel Duchamp’s idea of ready-made.Considering the city as a material, a “ready-made,” I combined the two to prolong the classic practice (of painting) in street today.
The idea is to make visible the less visible aspects of the city. Prior to this work, I had tried more straightly visible works, but Paris is visually saturated.
I turned to more subtle things, thus shadows made by electric lights in Paris at night. Less visible and and not an object itself, shadows are hardly noticeable. It's so subtle, almost opposite to logo, the most visible thing in the city. I made them visible and keep them stay during daytime, to leave the trace of unique lighting of Paris at night.
                
                
I did this work in NY and London. One in NY was exceptional as I traced the shadow of a homeless person, not urban facilities. He sleeps in the same place all day long, so almost part of a familiar scenery for people in NY. I made visible his almost invisible presence. In my solo museum exhibition, the work was shown with Manet; masterpiece The Absinthe Drinker in the same room.
                
                
MoCA君：是什么启发了你的“溶解”技能？有特殊的意义吗？
ZEVS: 在我的青少年时期，我对法国和美国的涂鸦很感兴趣并想要学习理解，特别是20世纪的概念绘画，例如伊夫克莱因的蓝色以及他对“不可见”的运用；杜尚也对我有很大影响，我把他“现成品”的概念带到城市当中，并且开始用这些现成品营造关于城市的新的概念和语境。
我产生溶解的想法是在我做“影子”系列的一个雨夜，我看到麦当劳的标志在向下流动，于是我开始了这项一年半的项目，尝试做一些作品抨击全球所有的大品牌。人们面对公司商标的时候会有很强烈的情绪，但当标志被溶解后则带来了新的想象和不同的情绪，品牌像是不朽的神，全球的品牌竞争就像是神的战争，而“ZEVS”神中之神，参与了这场战争并通过毁坏他们的主视觉打败了他们，正如视觉冲击打败了模型一样，溶解的商标也打败了其他不朽的品牌和他们的权力。
                
                
MoCA: What inspired your "Liquidation" technique？Is there a special significance？
ZEVS: As a teenager, I was interested in graffiti in France/America, but also in painting, especially of 20th century conceptual painting. I wanted to understand it. Yve Klein, for example, inspired me with his use of blue or his play with the non-visible. Duchamp is another influence. I applied his idea of ready-made to the city, and started using things already out there to effect new meanings and contexts in the city.
I had the inspiration for Liquidated Logo while doing Electric Shadow in a rainy night, where I saw a McDonald logo flowing down. I started this work about one and half year after Visual Kidnapping, trying to develop works to attack and criticize all powerful global brands.People feel strong emotion when facing corporate logo, but Liquidated Logo gives there new images and different emotion.Brands are trying to be immortal like a god. Thus the global brand business looks like a war of those gods, and “ZEVS,” the god of gods, joins the battle and kills them by destroying their image. Just as Visual attack “kill”s models, Liquidated Logo “kill”s otherwise immortal brands and their power.
                
                
MoCA君：是什么启发了你的“溶解”技能？有特殊的意义吗？
ZEVS: 在我的青少年时期，我对法国和美国的涂鸦很感兴趣并想要学习理解，特别是20世纪的概念绘画，例如伊夫克莱因的蓝色以及他对“不可见”的运用；杜尚也对我有很大影响，我把他“现成品”的概念带到城市当中，并且开始用这些现成品营造关于城市的新的概念和语境。
我产生溶解的想法是在我做“影子”系列的一个雨夜，我看到麦当劳的标志在向下流动，于是我开始了这项一年半的项目，尝试做一些作品抨击全球所有的大品牌。人们面对公司商标的时候会有很强烈的情绪，但当标志被溶解后则带来了新的想象和不同的情绪，品牌像是不朽的神，全球的品牌竞争就像是神的战争，而“ZEVS”神中之神，参与了这场战争并通过毁坏他们的主视觉打败了他们，正如视觉冲击打败了模型一样，溶解的商标也打败了其他不朽的品牌和他们的权力。
                
                
MoCA: What inspired your "Liquidation" technique？Is there a special significance？
ZEVS: As a teenager, I was interested in graffiti in France/America, but also in painting, especially of 20th century conceptual painting. I wanted to understand it. Yve Klein, for example, inspired me with his use of blue or his play with the non-visible. Duchamp is another influence. I applied his idea of ready-made to the city, and started using things already out there to effect new meanings and contexts in the city.
                
                
I had the inspiration for Liquidated Logo while doing Electric Shadow in a rainy night, where I saw a McDonald logo flowing down. I started this work about one and half year after Visual Kidnapping, trying to develop works to attack and criticize all powerful global brands.People feel strong emotion when facing corporate logo, but Liquidated Logo gives there new images and different emotion.Brands are trying to be immortal like a god. Thus the global brand business looks like a war of those gods, and “ZEVS,” the god of gods, joins the battle and kills them by destroying their image. Just as Visual attack “kill”s models, Liquidated Logo “kill”s otherwise immortal brands and their power.
MoCA君：你觉得在墙上画画和在画布上画有什么区别呢？
ZEVS: 对我来说两者都很有趣，两年前我在首尔艺术中心参加伟大的涂鸦展览，我制作了一幅8×20米的墙绘并对应了一系列油画，我决定在音乐厅前做一个行为艺术去总结整个作品，所以我对一个小组，23位来自艺术院校的年轻女性进行了训练，她们每人掌管一个颜色，确保一个姿势而且中间不休息，我没有参与其中但是我全程像一个指挥一样指导她们，表演在一天内就成功完成了。
                
                
                
                
MoCA: Do you see a difference in creating on a wall versus a piece of canvas？
ZEVS: Wall painting and canvases are both interesting matters to me . Two years ago in the Seoul Art Center, as part of Great Graffiti exhibition, I made an 8x20 meters painting made of a wall versus a series of canvases.The venue was in front of a music hall, and I decided to finalize the creation of the work by a performance. So, I trained a team of 23 young women from art schools, each in charge of one colour, to make the production in one gesture without break. I was not join the production by myself but guided the team from distance like a conductor. The action was successfully completed in one day.
MoCA君：你对中国的印象是什么？
ZEVS: 我对中国的印象就是中国有很长的历史，伟大的文明和许多种族。如今是干净的环境，发达的交通和伟大的艺术风景。
                
                
MoCA: What’s your impression of China？
ZEVS: My impression of China was a long history, big civilization and many ethnicities. Today I would say clean environment, developed transportation and great art scenery.