Connect 照映
2019，莎莉．理查森 、許雁婷，TAV藝術採集計畫「按了兩次空白鍵」
我們都是藝術家，是女性。
在這個我們開始連結的空間—台北國際藝術村，創作這個作品。從各自的藝術實踐中對話，照映到我們的生活，透過藝術我們找到連結。
這個共同創作雖在媒材上各自獨立，聲音由許雁婷創作，影像來自莎莉．理查森，裝置、文字與圖片則是一起尋找產生的；但過程中持續互相丟接回應，看似獨立的每個作品間也彼此對話。這樣的創作過程也反映我們認識至今的體悟：透過相異文化的友誼/夥伴關係,重新認識自己與自身的文化、認同，並回饋到創作上。並在這次創作中延伸至與其他女性藝術家的連結。
我們探索地景、空間與個人創作之間的關係，以文字、圖像、採訪/錄音聲音及影像等素材相互丟接，在每次的對話中容許觀點的轉移、感知與理解的變動，在此中找到更深刻的連結，而我們都知道，這趟創作與尋找的旅程沒有終點。
以我們⻑期以來的對話為基礎，這次作品再與其他女性藝術家/藝術工作者對話。作品試圖照映藝術家的生活與其藝術實踐的關係。我們聆聽個人的創作經驗、探詢一個人如何看待「藝術家」這個詞彙、身份，討論自己的創作，關於擁有追尋自我完成的自由。她們如何存在於一個空間，如何發聲，如何擁有話語權。這些(或許)(曾經)都不是容易的事。在這個觀看、探訪當代女權實踐的過程中，也發現了理解與表達的文化與世代差異。
分享、對話與其他藝術家的文字、話語都成為這個作品的靈感來源。然而語言是危險的、有權力的、挑釁的、有力量的。自由與選擇，脆弱與勇敢，缺席與在場，可見及不可見，發聲及沈默，孤獨與社群，連結與私密，個人及政治……等等，都是啟發這次創作的字詞，同時也是訪問中時常被提及的主題。
我們聆聽、對話，對外向內地提出疑惑。
我們看見有多少不同的擁抱這個世界的方式。我們照見彼此。
我們邀請你來到這裡，在我們的空間裡擁有自己的空間與力量。
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參與藝術家 / 受訪者 Interviewees:
于恩平 YU En-Ping、余彥芳 YU Yen-Fang、吳可雲 Ann Wu、馬慧妍 MA Wai-In、陳繪彌 Aephie Huimi Chen、黃立慧 HUANG Li-Hui、廖苡晴 Yiching LIAO、董桂汝 Kuei-Ju Tung、克萊爾・布什比 Claire Bushby、蘿拉・博伊尼斯 Laura Boynes、許雁婷 Yenting HSU、莎莉・理查森 Sally Richardson
莎莉與雁婷2015年透過澳洲Asialink與台北國際藝術村的交流計畫相遇，持續合作至今，希望透過這次短期駐村合作重新思考藝術駐村的本質，並再次找到我們之間、我們與地方之間的連結。
CONNECT 照映
Sally Richardson & Yenting Hsu
We set out to create this work from a space where we connected, that we were artists and women. We invited each other to reflect on our practice and our art, art that offers up a mirror to life, and through art we find connection.
This is a combined co-creation that represents a genuine collaboration, the sounds created by Yenting, the imagery by Sally, the words generated together. Each piece incomplete without both responses. ‘We are changed by the experience of each other in ways we can never anticipate. Through your eyes I see myself, my country, my culture and my creative practice in new ways. As we share stories, places, experiences, you reflect myself back to me, re-writing and re-framing my sense of identity. I see myself played back to myself, but in ways I have never seen before.’
We come together interweaving reflections of place and creative space into a combined hybrid portrait that reflects upon our individual artistic practice. Through the layering of found materials, objects and imagery, recorded sound, voice and vision a conversation across borders and boundaries is generated. In the combination of elements and forms, in the conversations with others, connections are found, something new is discovered and arrived at. Point of view shift and alter, perception and understanding changes, new directions are possible……the creative journey, like the life journey, continues, and with no end point.
Seeking to explore inspiration and creative practice, our connections to place and ourselves, the work offers a mirror up to life of the artists. We listen to personal histories of creative practice, of the discovery of the right to occupy space and call oneself ‘artist’, to speak and have a ‘voice’, an artistic expression, the freedom to pursue one’s own life…and knowing this is not easy.
We are defining a contemporary feminist praxis that reflects upon our own experience while examining how our understanding of the expression of feminism is experienced culturally within an East/West dichotomy. What is similar? What is different?
Reflection and sharing, conversations and words have inspired this work. Both talking and listening. Words can be dangerous, powerful, provocative and potent – they inspire, challenge and reach out to us…we ask; whose words inspire you? What words motivate you? What words do you ‘need’ to ‘keep on’ going’? Some of the words that have inspired this work are; freedom and choice, absence and presence, visible and invisible, voice and silence, solitude and community, connection and intimacy, the personal and the political.
We invite you to be present, to claim your space in our space.
Yenting and Sally first met through the Asialink Reciprocal Exchange program in 2015. We seek in this new residency project to feel the connection again, and through the collaborative work to reflect upon exchange and the topics we both care about in relation to self, friendship, cultural difference, and our practice as women artists. All of these works were developed and created while the artists were on residencies in Australia, Iceland, Paris, New York & Taiwan.