在純藝術與應用藝術之間——李再鈐的〈低限的無限〉

Between Pure Art and Applied Art–Li Tsai-Chien's ''Finite to Infinite''

本文嘗試以「應用藝術／純藝術」的歷史架構來考察李再鈐的創作，同時以1986年的「紅色事件」為中心，探討在此歷史架構下的藝評呈現出什麼特徵。過去對李再鈐〈低限的無限〉的討論若不是從純藝術的角度，強調其低限主義的風格，就是把紅色事件當成是藝術家對抗體制的例證，而這些兩極化的觀點往往只呈現了美術環境的部分實況。事實上，當時純藝術創作很難與應用藝術分開。在創作〈低限的無限〉之前，有十幾年李再鈐主要從事商業設計工作。長期的設計經驗很難無涉於純藝術的造型思考，也很難不聯想到〈低限的無限〉裡強烈的幾何風格。其次，該作的風格是一種開放性的形式。觀者可以圍繞著作品觀賞，而沒有單一主導或正面性的視角。這種開放性允許相當程度的自由詮釋，而且這種自由詮釋實際上也包含了使其成為「紅色星星」，並引發爭議的視象在內。在戒嚴時期，紅星可以是指涉共產黨的政治禁忌。在紅色事件中，〈低限的無限〉很快地被界定為這類圖像，從而也顯示出政治性解讀在大眾視覺文化中的優位性。不過，當時的評論並未切中批評這種優位性，反而基於純藝術的理念將該事件歸因為大眾對藝術的無知。在此，筆者的評論即在於：該作品的評論關鍵點應在於獨斷的政治性解讀損壞了作品的開放性。不僅由此可看出〈低限的無限〉似乎只能在解嚴後找到它真正的觀眾，相對地，過去所謂的「純藝術」概念其實更多反應出對當時周遭政治社會氛圍的消極應對與恐懼。

My paper tries to sketch Li Tsai-Chien’s creation in the historical frame of“applied art/pure art”, and at the same time discusses the characteristics of criticisms in the 1986’s“Red Incident”. Li Tsai-Chien’s“Finite to Infinite”has long been considered either a Minimalism sculpture from the perspective of pure art, or a mere example of artists against the establishment in the 1986’s“Red Incident”. Those polarized perspectives , however, reveal only part of the story about the artistic condition. In fact, the so called“pure artistic creation”was hard to be secluded from applied arts at the time. Li Tsai-Chien, for example, had been devoted to commercial designs for about 10 years before the making of“Finite to Infinite”. It is hard to imagine his experiences of formal analysis in designs had nothing to do with his pure artistic creation, nor did the apparent geometric style in the“Finite to Infinite”. Second, such a geometric style is also an open form. Without a privilege or frontal perspective, this work assumes that people can walk around it, appreciate it from any direction. This openness allows free interpretation in some extent, and in fact includes the controversial visual image that denotes this work as a red star viewed from a specific angle. In the martial period of Taiwan, a red star could be a political taboo for its implication of Communism. In Red Incident, the“Finite to Infinite”was soon defined in this way, and thus reflected the priority of political interpretation in public visual cultures. However, instead of criticizing this priority, past criticisms, based on the idea of pure art, often imputed“Red Incident”to the general public’s ignorance of artistic common sense. My criticism is that the work did not limit anyone to exert his own imagination on it even without any artistic knowledge. The critical point of this Incident is that the singular political interpretation has jeopardized the openness of the work. From this perspective,“Finite to Infinite”seems to find his presupposed audience in the post-martial period of Taiwan and, on the contrary, the idea of“pure art”and its relative criticisms seemed to reflect an attitude of passive responds to social and political ethos from 1970s.