眺島

Milky way

 

2020 / 單頻道錄像（約9分鐘）、花窗彩繪（450x250cm）

2020 / video (single channel, 9mins), stained glass (450x250cm)

 

張恩滿憶起，目睹歐陽文在1950年代於綠島冒險偷拍的照片時，對在政治犯前毫無防備坦露胸部的綠島婦女，內心興起的純淨自然感受;以及，閱讀胡子丹的《我在綠島3212天》中提到，在山上勞動時，遇到「吃人樹」，皮膚碰到之處奇癢、浮腫，遇見綠島上身赤裸，似乎正餵完奶的小婦人，「一眼看到被吃人樹吃了的人，便奔迎出來，把他拉進胸前，用手壓擠自己兩個豐挺的乳房，又白又稠的乳水淋浴似直射一臉一身，叫他自己用擦揉癢痛的傷處，面對如此鏡頭，我們全有哭而哭不出來的感覺，有向她下跪而不敢下跪的衝動。」內心深感震驚。於是，她將這些腦中影像結合丁托列托（Jacopo Ti ntoretto）的名畫〈銀河系的起源〉（The Origin of the Milky Way），以花窗彩繪的方式呈現。〈銀河系的起源〉根據的是希臘神話故事:天神宙斯命人將剛出生的婚外私生兒子赫拉克勒斯(Heracles)，帶到天后希拉身邊，想趁她熟睡時吸允其奶水，藉此獲得神力。希拉從睡夢中驚醒，奶水噴湧而出，便化做了燦爛的銀河。〈眺島〉這件作品，還包含兩段影片，一段是搬動石頭的影像，一段是剪輯多段國民政府宣揚和台東、蘭嶼相關治理的宣傳影片，宣揚著諸如:「這些受過訓練的山地優秀青年，將來參加反共戰鬥行列 ...... 都是為國效忠的政戰志士」之類的口號。除此之外，影片中的石頭，也和過去政治犯在海邊挖掘咾咕石的勞動，甚至，和凱達格蘭大道上原民運動的石頭，以及更多更多沈默的石頭遙相呼應。

 

藝術家如此自述:「火燒島、大島與蘭嶼島，它們鄰近可以彼此眺望， 在有意識與無意識被禁錮中，平行乘載歷史之業。回首洋流，浪頭隨潮波， 仰望同個星空，藉由希拉女神的乳汁連結跳島，連結政治治理下的分裂時空。」

  

CHANG En-Man recalls seeing the photos taken by Ouyang Wen at serious risk of being caught on Green Island in the 1950s that the local women were unguardedly topless in front of the political prisoners, which gave her a profound sense of natural purity. She was also astonished by HU Zi-Dan’s evocative description in his book 3,212 Days on Green Island in which a man came upon a “man-eating tree” in his toils up the mountains, itching terribly and swelling where it touches. Then came a bare-chested inhabitant, seemingly fresh from breast feeding, who “darted forth at the sight of man being consumed by a man-eating tree, pulls him up to her bosom, presses on her supple breasts, and spurts out a thick and shower-like milk on him, which she asks the man to rub into his wounds. Facing such situation, we have an inner urge to cry without actually being able to, and a rush to kneel but dare not,” stricken at the core. Therefore, employing the form of colored rose window, the artist integrated her mental images into Jacopo Tintoretto’s famous painting The Origin of the Milky Way. The painting was based on Greek myth that Zeus demanded Athena to bring the infant Heracles, one of his illegitimate children, to the sleeping Hera, for Heracles could acquire supernatural powers from Hera’s divine milk. Hera was woken by this act, while her milk sprayed across the heavens and there formed the Milky Way. CHANG’s work Milky Way consists of two videos. One shows people moving stones, and the other is a montage of the Nationalist government’s propaganda about its governance of Taitung, and Orchid Island, chanting slogans like “These trained, excellent young indigenous people will join the cause of anti-Communism...They are devoted political warriors who give their full allegiance to their country.” Besides, the stones in the video seem to echo not only the work of former political prisoners in the past digging the coral stones at the seaside, but also the stones in the Taiwanese indigenous movement on Ketagalan Boulevard and more silent stones echoed away.

 

“Fire-licked Island, Main Island and Orchid Island are so close geographically that they are within one another’s sight. In the fell clutch of circumstance, whether self-imposed or involuntary, they share a turbulent history. Apart from looking back at the ocean current and the crest of tidal waves, they look up at the same starry sky. I plan to associate Hera’s breast milk with island-hopping, with the split space-time under political governance,” CHANG stated so.