The Immortal Fairy Tales of the Spotless Voices

Mirza Cizmic

Artemin Gallery

芬蘭藝術家 Mirza Cizmic，1985年生於波士尼亞與赫塞哥維納 (Bosnia and Herzegovina)，這個國家位於東南歐，台灣人不太熟悉。今年38歲育有兩子的的身為父親的藝術家Cizmic現正處於術創作力如繁花盛放的階段，看他作品好像在欣賞一部又一部劇情緊湊的電影，而且內容以不按牌理出牌居多，有非常多的作品包含地獄梗，看了令人樂不可支。大家可能會覺得藝術家Cizmic這人徹徹底底就是一個冷面笑匠呀！或說，他本身是喜劇演員或喜劇導演吧？

Mirza Cizmic現階段藝術上的表現，讓人很難聯想他在波士尼亞與赫塞哥維納在戰亂中的童年究竟是怎麼渡過的。回應這苦澀的運命，他引述馬克吐溫的一句話：「勇氣並非無懼，而是對抗恐懼，戰勝恐懼。」這句話聽起來只是一種讓人過目就忘的心靈雞湯，但對他來說根本是一步一步走過的、很深刻的一段路。童年總是值得人花一輩子探索，或對人的一生留下深遠的影響。一家人決定離開煙硝中的波士尼亞，那一年，Cizmic 9歲。他的作品曾經是有關大逃亡的印象，那是如出埃及記一般的出走，以他紮實的繪畫技巧所能達到的繪畫性，融合他的人生歷練，完全具備了創作史詩的能力。但當時的他就用偏冷冽的調性去畫，沒有大開大闔、沒有哭天搶地、不對歷史做悲情的控訴。

而近年Cizmic 專注於個人小敘事。他營造劇場效果，在創作中拼貼自己幻想中的過去，把好幾種俗世荒誕情節濃縮在一起，加油添醋使之更荒謬，明明在講自己（不存在）的童年回憶，卻好像保持一個略帶批判的距離，導演出別人的故事，講出妙趣橫生的 fairy tales？作為一位父親，他現階段創作的基本思考真是單純無暇，原意只是要跟自己的孩子一起探索他們的童年，同時也藉機彌補自己童年的遺憾。但這位「導演」創作了非常多戲劇般的畫作，內容層次竟是越來越豐富。

例如本展中尺幅最大的一件作品Breakfast on the Grass was never Édouard’s idea是 Cizmic 向愛德華·馬奈 (Édouard Manet) 於 1862-1863 年創作的傑作《草地上的午餐》(The Picnic) 致敬。Cizmic 少年時在藝術學校大量臨摹歐洲名畫，獲得紮實的訓練，其中，馬奈是他一直以來的最愛。他在此作的構圖上仍如馬奈該作品有著明顯的前、中、近景之區別以及明暗交錯，另則他對人們日常生活隨興至粗糙的一面描繪得極為細膩，充滿活力。歷史上受馬奈啟發的作品眾多，Cizmic 此作美感部分來自馬奈 160 年前留下的遺產，部分來自 Cizmic 融合了各種幽靈元素和不可思議的情節。

他也試著用 True Bride’s Chronicles、Art Class – Stories about the contemporary drawings、You were always my princess等成熟的油畫作品探討：究竟如何定義藝術？Cizmic 說他畫這三件作品床尾、黑板、畫紙上的兒童畫時，費了些心思模仿兒童畫的線條，這比畫其他部分困難得多。近年童趣塗鴉繪畫蔚為風潮，創作者不講究構圖、筆觸、色感等，這個流行似乎貶低了藝術創作所需的知識，Cizmic對此現象頗不以為然，觀眾或許也能藉此比較、思索。

另外，值得一提的是他作品裡的性別政治正確。身為一名直男藝術家，他直接告白：「我非常崇敬女性！我的母親是我的人生榜樣！我特別欣賞我太太充滿能量的一面！」所以其作品中往往是女性支配整個場面，有時他甚至不想強調陰性氣質，是男是女都可以，不必拘泥。Metamorphosis 系列便是Mirza Cizmic 創作的經典樣貌之一。作品中的男子本身貌似充滿男性雄風，卻被他所處的荒唐情境翻轉成為笑話一則，一群看似人畜無害的三姑六婆非但不怕露鳥男子，還群起譏笑他，滅其雄風。

此次展覽更有幾件給予聲音、皮膚感官體驗之作。例如觀看Sing like a bird, sting like a bee 好像聽到尖銳的男（女？）高音、有幾件描繪戶外活動的作品令人感受到溫度，但Cizmic最高明的是他總有辦法讓人分辨不出是冷還是熱。

他作品中荒謬的場景，極為寫實，這是最令人不安的地方，與卡夫卡 (Franz Kafka) 筆下的情境非常相似。Cizmic 作品，無論是否為 Metamorphosis變形系列，在在都像《變形記》的開頭一樣挑戰我們人類的體面──「早上，戈勒各爾．薩摩札從朦朧的夢中醒來，發現自己躺在床上，變成了大毒蟲。堅硬得像鐵甲般的背朝下，仰臥在那裡。」在我們思忖片刻過後，Cizmic 又有哪一件畫作不是清晰透明到近乎異樣，毫不保留地揭露人們內心暗黑的角落？他營造的喜劇甚至鬧劇的情節揭露了真實的人性、性、慾望、亦標舉了他的政治觀，一幕一幕嘈嘈切切成就了他的 fairy tales of the spotless voices。

The Immortal Fairy Tales of the Spotless Voices| Mirza Cizmic

展期 : 2023/07/22 – 09/02

開幕：2023/07/22 ｜14：00 – 17：00

地點 : Artemin Gallery (111 台北市士林區基河路251巷32號1樓)

Artemin Gallery is pleased to announce the opening of “The Immortal Fairy Tales of the Spotless Voices,” the Finnish artist Mirza Cizmic’s Taiwan debut solo exhibition, showcasing over ten new paintings created in 2023. The exhibition is on view from July 22 to September 2, 2023.

Finnish artist Mirza Cizmic was born in 1985 in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a country located in Southeast Europe that may not be familiar to Taiwanese people. The father/artist Cizmic is currently in a phase of abundant artistic creativity. Looking at his paintings, one would think every single piece is like a drama; reviewing one after another, one feels like one is watching an intense and unconventional movie. They feature a variety of hellish gags that will make people burst out laughing. You may think that the artist Cizmic is a deadpan comedian.

Cizmic’s artistic expression at this stage makes it hard to imagine that he spent his childhood in war-torn Bosnia and Herzegovina. In response to this bitterness in life, he quoted a sentence from Mark Twain: “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.” This sounds like a chicken-soup-for-the-soul cliché, but its profound meaning is a step-by-step route that has led him to where he is today. Childhood is always worth exploring for a lifetime, and leaves a profound impact on one’s character. The year the family decided to leave Bosnia amidst the smoke, Mirza was 9 years old. Inevitably, his works used to depict the impression of their escape, resembling a modern-day Exodus. In recent years, Mirza’s thinking has turned back to reflect on himself. Starting from personal narrative, he integrates his imagination, the painting that can be achieved with his solid skills, combined with his life experience, and is fully equipped with the creation to make some epic art. But he neither constructs a grand discourse, nor does he make a sad accusation against history. Rather, he creates theatrical effects and condenses so many kinds of daily life by patching his own fantasy childhood and daily observation in collage, showing his use of appropriated imagery in dreamlike, evocative painting.

Although he seems to be recounting his own childhood memories, he maintains a slightly critical distance, as if directing other people’s stories and telling whimsical fairy tales. As a father, moving on to a new stage of life and art career, he possesses a very pure and simple idea, which is to explore his sons’ childhoods and, at the same time, compensate for the regrets of his own childhood. However, this “director” has created numerous dramatic paintings with increasingly rich content.

One of the largest artworks in this exhibition, titled Breakfast on the Grass was never Édouard’s idea, for example, pays tribute to Édouard Manet’s masterpiece Le déjeuner sur l’herbe (The Picnic) created in 1862-1863. When Cizmic was an art school student, he was trained to make replicas of European masterpieces, from which he developed solid painterly skills. Among the masters he learned from, Manet is his all-time favorite. The composition of Breakfast on the Grass was never Édouard’s idea exhibits clear distinctions among foreground, middle ground, and background, as well as a contrast of light and shadow, while he carefully portrays the rough aspects of people’s mundane lives. It is one of his Manet-inspired artworks and believed to be the most uncanny piece as the painting is incubated by Manet’s legacy from 160 years ago and combines ghostly elements and incredible plots from the contemporary world.

In response to the contemporary dispute over art, Cizmic interrogates the definition of art through his sophisticated oil paintings such as True Bride’s Chronicles, Art Class – Stories about the contemporary drawings, and You were always my princess. Cizmic said that when he painted the children’s drawings on the bed board, the blackboard, and the drawing paper, he put in extra effort to imitate the lines of children’s drawings, which was much more challenging than painting the rest. In recent years, childlike doodle has prevailed, so that it seems composition, brushstroke, and coloring are no longer the gravitas of the “artists.” This trend seems to diminish the knowledge required for artistic creation, toward which Cizmic is somewhat disapproving. Viewers are invited to compare and contemplate this.

Furthermore, it is worth mentioning the political correctness in gender in his works. His straightforward manifestation is greatly appreciated as he said, “I respect women very much! My mother is my role model, and I admire my wife and her strength.” Therefore, women dominating an entire scene is recurrent in his paintings. And sometimes he abandons femininity and even allows for ambiguity in gender, blurring the boundaries of genders. The Metamorphosis series is one of Mirza Cizmic’s signature style. The men in the works always appear to be full of masculinity; however, the artist deliberately subverts this by ridiculing the men and portraying them in absurd situations. For instance, we can observe a group of amiable elderly women who, instead of being intimidated by a half-nude guy, are blatantly mocking his exposed body.

Moreover, the exhibition features several paintings that are “voice-based” or provide sensory experiences. For example, simply seeing Sing like a bird, sting like a bee gives the illusion of hearing sharp tenor (or soprano?) screaming. And several works depicting outdoor activities evoke a sense of temperature; however, Cizmic’s remarkable skill lies in his ability to blur the line between cold and hot, making it difficult for viewers to discern.

The absurd scenes in Cizmic’s works are, as a matter of fact, highly realistic, and it is most unsettling that it bears a strong resemblance to the situations portrayed by Franz Kafka in his novella Metamorphosis. “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. He was lying on his hard, as it were armor-plated, back……” Cizmic’s paintings, whether from the “Metamorphosis” series or not, challenge our human decency just like the opening lines of The Metamorphosis. After a second thought, we would all agree that Cizmic’s paintings are crystal clear to the point of peculiarity, revealing the dark corners of people’s inner selves without any reserve. The comedic and even farcical plots he creates expose true human nature, libido, desires, and his political views. Each episode put together accomplishes his “fairy tales of the spotless voices,” however clamorously they may be.