Nightwatcher of Prosperity and Void (part)
<Conflict and Choice> the Document of the Second Round Contemporary Young Sculptor Invitation Exhibition
Write by Laodao [Shenzhen]
Translator: Hongwei Li
Lu Bin’s sadness and loneliness lead to his art works’ particularity and distinction in the art world. Living in urban life filled with desire for fashionable trends and in contemporary art characterized as uncertain and risky, Lu Bin and his art are faced with the same destiny---solitude of post guard. Nowadays, artistic activities have transformed towards various competitions that transcend cultural meaning and life experience. Because of the desire of being presence in advance, the tangle between artists and politics, no matter cooperation or resist. Since they are craving for temporary success, their ability of independent judgment on art are being weakened. Avant-garde spirit is being pushed by so-called elitism. Now we are on the express train of innovation and creation. In such circumstance, “New human being”can deal with collective spiritual confusion and horror only with the weapon of speed and oblivion. Unfortunately, this is also one aspect of contemporary art. Solzhenitsyn asserted with deep anxiety that it is the endless infatuation for novelty that push us to step into abyss of sufferings. Perhaps Lu Bin was naturally tardive, or he once doubted or lost his goal when he ran after fashionable trends. This made him like an old heritage when he was young during this contemporary age. Out of his innocence or sense of mission, he felt that he always missed the express train of virtual innovation and new art. After experiencing repeated disappointment and regret, he became voluntarily ready for his untimeliness. As his life tend to more and more marginal, the code of ceramic art handed down through generations became his intimate friend he encountered in an unfamiliar place. Consequently, his life and art are far away from external pressures. For instance, we can’t see any cultural traces of modern and post-modern age from his works named “Brick and Wood Series”, “Movable Character Series”, “Wall Series”. But we can clearly get a sense of pureness and silence by viewing his work, if we see them from his inner world.
Making ceramic art is kind of self-cultivation. His seriousness about this life-long pursuit for ceramic art is beyond his own imagination. The art of ceramic, which differs from modern ceramic art, suddenly gives a sense of glory and responsibility to present people. In “Urban Series”, those factors from the hot smelting furnace now become cold “vulgarian”. The structure of man and woman life was hidden in the “Urban Series --- Pot”; The tonic was brought on sacrificial utensil of man and woman. The dead fish body covered by salve mull from “Urban Series --- Year by year enough” was clearly printed on big double happiness”. All of these traditional images have disappeared with the passage of time, but they still rest in people’s mind as if they were eternal oblations for ancestors. Since they are not for living people but for past ones, the appearance preponderates over its content. So many enthusiastic ceremonies in our world convey a sense of rigidness and coldness, like things in inferno.
Reality is stuffed with various mundane desires. People are used to such reality as a result of their nature and acquired knowledge. They are struggling for life while trying to keep their pure pursuit; they celebrate those great ceremonies with their bodies while they are totally indifferent in their hearts. They are self-contradictory, but also quiet self-content. In “Urban Series” ，Lu Bin neither describe those mundane shining ornaments as fascinating enchanters, nor irritate people and let them criticize and strike mundane life, like offering a target for revolutionaries. Instead, he makes art like a doctor and flaman who is serious and knows the sufferings very well. He is very clear that the ugly and rotten things will gradually emerge from deep ground after the disappearance of splendid and shining of its surface. Since Lu Bin is not hostile with reality, his realistic critique like observing, listening and asking, can suddenly and profoundly stirs people’s mind, like Acupuncture and mosibustion, prick people after grating them.
Lu Bin’s art does not have an agreement with any truth or fashionable trend. He is lonely, inward, and immersed in his art and life. In the colorful and changeful urban life, every day is festival. The shadow of Lu Bin’s working body and shinning furnace fire are being forgotten. Lu Bin, like a night watchman, lives in an endlessly quiet wildness. Superficial splendor of urban life falls into his smelting furnace, bisque, put on slip, and fire to 1160 degree. The modern emotion of oxidation atmosphere and the artist whose face was covered by plain soil and ash reflects the humor of the sense of solemn and sadness. The real art just likes alchemy. It does not require prediction, but discovery. But the big influence just comes from the genius and stupid in this process.
Because of the concentration and irony, this classic expectation made “Urban Series” has a sense of isolation from the world. It had better to be buried at the end of twentieth century; perhaps it can attract more attentions after decades. People would not like to seriously face up their blooded wounds, but they can infinitely soothe them. Oblivion and reminiscent mood are the parents of gaudy. They rooted in the heart of human being, occasionally produce superficial decor, spray gold powder and silver pieces, and make the world splendid and shinning.