Generally we believe that facts and evidence help establish the ‘what-has-been’, yet they are not accountable for a truth. The burdens of facts and evidence are in fact multifaceted. In recent years, ‘what is real’ or ‘what is the truth’ has become a popular enquiry, covering topics ranging from real universal suffrage, real childhood, mockumentary, reality TV, to realities and truths presented by the algorithm behind social media and search engine, and lately, Oxford Dictionaries’ word of the year 2016, ‘post-truth’. If we see ‘evidence’ as data just obtained, then it is worth exploring what else they could answer besides a truth.

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While people demand the truth about things and appreciate realness in life, as creative agents we artists also explore aesthetic truths. For example, creating a portrait would involve not only studying the physical features, personalities and social roles of the subject, but also technical aspects, conscious selection as well as the subjectivity of the artist, no matter he/she is a painter or a biopic filmmaker. We research and gather materials from real life as starting points of our art-making but also rely on ambiguity, abstraction and imagination to transform them into fantastical works. From expressionism, dada, surrealism and beyond, we even value sensual, non-rational, non-empirical ways of obtaining knowledge and seeking meanings of things. This project begins with an invitation to the participating artists to explore how we negotiate between these parallel roles as contemporary artists - bearing responsibility for inquiring and observing reality and the truth, yet exercising our license to make believe and create. Each of us has been interested in and working on projects that point to the ‘what-hasbeen’, and along the development, we discuss and reflect on these questions:

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As someone who produces art,
   • Do you feel you have certain responsibility towards your subjects and the materials you collect?
   • Where is truth to you?

 

Encompassing topics related to past love from Swing Lam, traffic incidence from Eric Tsang, news broadcasting from Solomon Yu and public auction from Archive of the People, the presented works here offer fictions, poetry, doubts, inquiries, alternatives, new knowledge, even actions that simultaneously intervene real life. Other Sides of Evidence invites further discussion about creative possibilities atop of exploring a truth.

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                                                                                           Solomon Yu, artist-curator

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我們普遍認為可以透過事實和證據確定曾經發生了的事，但它們其實是有其他面向的，並且不須對真相負責。近年公眾熱烈討論什麼是「真確」、哪些是「真相」，涉及的範疇廣泛，從真普選真童年、偽紀錄片真人秀，到社交媒體和搜索器經運算後呈現的現實和真相，及至2016 年牛津字典年度詞彙「後真相」等。所謂「確據」其實只是一些可獲取的資訊數據，除有助指向一種真相，它們的其他面向可能更值得我們思考探索。

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人們探求事物的真相，欣賞和享受真確的生活。而作為富有創造力的能動者，藝術家也探求美學中的真實。不論畫家還是傳記電影導演，描繪一位對象不僅需要研究其體型特徵、個性和身份，還會涉及技術性的考慮、創作者自己主觀和有意識的取捨。我們取材於現實生活作為創作的起點，但也有賴含蓄與抽象化的表達和想像力將素材轉化成奇幻的作品。在表現主義、達達和超現實主義之後，我們還會重視那些透過感性、非理性、無法實證的方法獲取的新知識和意義。這個展覽邀請參與的藝術家探索和觀察現實確據的同時，行使他們的特權進行多樣的創作，並就著以下問題進行討論和分享 : 

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作為藝術創作人，
   • 你會否覺得要對你的研究對象和收集回來的材料負什麼責任？
   • 真確於你在哪？

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展覽中作品指涉的往事包括 : 林兆榮的逝去感情、曾梓洋的道路事故、余廸文的新聞導及人人檔案的公開拍賣――當中展現了詩詞小說、懷疑提問、或是與真相並存的平行現實、超越常理的新知識、甚至是一種直接介入當下實況的行動。「確據的其他面向」在此作為一個引子，邀請大家一同討論探究真確及藝術創作兩者關係的多樣性。

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                                                                                余廸文，展覽策劃 / 藝術家