郭亚冠：没有神话的仪式

We call him “Old Guo” or “Boss Guo”, with the black shirt and the ponytail, Boss Guo appears on the scene with a domineering attitude, like the characters in the Hong Kong Mafia Movies in the 1980s.

The inspiration for Guo’s work Your Ark is Parked in One of My Unknown Dreams presented in the exhibition, comes from Tengchong in Yunan Province. Guo says: “Tengchong is a magical place where you can daydream: it is a peculiar environment that nurtures fantasy and imagination. Although it is located in the southwest corner of China, in winter it is hit by the chilly wind from the north”. The heavy snow of the past 50 years did not reach his knees. Luckily the snow did not influence the lively environment of the lake.  Sometimes the reeds rustle in the wind with birds flying around. 

Guo incorporates the poem into his painting, and he proposes a naturalized interpretation rituals. In his work Ritual Thinking, when Mario Perniola talks about "the ritual without myth", he actually refers to the "ritual of ritual", which means that the behavioral procedures and formulas that occur during a ritual are not subject to the purpose and function of the ritual itself, as it was in the past. On the contrary, they become habits and way of thinking.  His works are inspired by actual events and experiences; the existence of rituals dispels the narrative and the realistic elements while becoming the "myth" of modern society.

“总有一群鸭子划过一片安静的水面来打破现实与虚幻的平衡。往往让我陶醉的就是这比现实景色还美的投影在不经意间被一个未知的事物打破，这种碎裂像是一种清洗。一个事物在同一的状态太久了总要重新洗牌，把它搅乱后再让它慢慢恢复平静，也像是一种解救。镜像里的事物是对现实的完全模仿，一阵风，一只鱼，一只鸭子，都可以用自己力量去唤醒这些裹挟在现实事物里没有一点自由的影子，水中扭动的倒影终于脱去身上的枷锁，我看到了他们仰天长啸的背影和亢奋的舞姿。”

—— 郭亚冠

The perfect balance between reality and illusion on the water surface was quickly broken by a group of ducks. What often makes me intoxicated is that this projection, which is more beautiful than the actual scenery, is inadvertently broken by a random thing, which is more of a kind of cleansing. Anything that stays in the same state for too long will be inevitably reshuffled. The process of reducing it to chaos is also the rescue. The things in the mirror are complete imitations of reality. A gust of wind, a fish or a duck can awaken these shadows that are chained mirrors. The dancing reflections in the water finally remove the shackles of their bodies. And I was sure that I saw their dances.

--Guo Yaguan

Your painting encompasses a broad artistic realm and has many cultural connotations. What should be stressed is that the visual impact of your work comes from something that is beyond the familiar images presented by the whole work as well as its details, which is rare in our school. On the contrary, what people is comfortable and used to look at is considered to be lousy cliches. The visual impact of your works is usually accompanied by "weird" artistic representations and connotations that create a narrative structure. In this way, your work becomes an attractive and at the same time bewildering novel.

--Ma Lu

(Central Academy of Fine Arts, Dean of Fine Arts School, Professor of Oil Painting Department)

Picking up leaves in the harvest season of Tengchong, Guo gives new life to the leaves in his artworks: they sometimes become titan trees, sometimes become a paradise for children, sometimes hitch a long balloon which flying over the mountains. Guo uses different materials to decorate the night forests combining the formal elements of the painting with the content, disclosing a flush or warm blood.

Guo Yaguan at Tengchong, 2016