如何提升自己的魅力？今天，在通行全球的社交媒体上，从拥有5000到5万个甚至500万粉丝的意见领袖和网络红人都在向外持续输出他们的魅力心得。护肤，健身，美甲，让你的外表变得光鲜；提升礼仪，学习外语，心理疗愈，让自己的内在变得美丽；还有关于打造人设，炮制笑料，增加领导力等等各式教程。
所有这些有关魅力的种种行为与表达，在今天时代的媒介洪流中，往往都不是以著书立说的方式被传播的，而是以图像的逻辑被制造、显示、营销。抑或静态，抑或动态。更值得注意的是，这些魅力图像的生产机制通常不是采用经典的摄影方法，在社交媒体语境下，更加通俗的处理方式是：下载，截屏，转发，修图，美颜，拼贴，挪用，模因（Meme）。这些动作都与经典的依赖光学元件的图像制造设备的逻辑有着本质不同——它们跳过了图像生产而进入到了图像消费。这种图像制造方式简化了或者干脆省略了摄影原本所需的前期和摄制工作，而沉浸在后期。并且，这种后期也与传统意义上的后期并不相同，在我看来这是一种“后后期”。
今天，在魅力的驱动下，这一“后后期”转向塑造了当下的图像制造生态。图像的制造者和观看者保持着一种默契，他们忽略现实而只想看到一种幻想。图像在魅力的裹挟下演化成了魅惑，一种消费主义般的困惑。在这个进程中，我们见证的一个重要事实即是艺术家的缺席。这种以图像为内容的基于移动设备和社交网络的图像生态，与在它之前出现的种种图像生态相比，截然不同。从前，专业的视觉艺术群体才是图像的最重要生产者，比如画家和摄影师。特别是在今日中国，此种图像生态中最为领先的和最具影响力的参与者反而是善于营销也深谙流量密码的网红，及其背后的公司即营销机构MCN。这种大规模的图像制造在满足大众传播各参与方需求的同时，也正在演变成一种“套路”化的魅力。
反观上述的种种现象，拥有视觉传达设计背景的夏诚安，选择了一种特立独行的艺术实践，他在创作中混合了平面设计师应用视觉文化的能力与当代艺术家解构经济社会的愿景。夏诚安不是以高雅文化（high culture）为策略，选择对大流行般的图像生态视而不见，而是有态度地参与其中。
夏诚安亲自下场的方式是将他自己的个人视觉形象暴露无遗，用摄影、观念艺术、计算机图像和数字后期技术来制造一种对自我的迷恋。在个展《夏诚安：人造魅力》中，我们可以进一步看到他是如何制造图像进而诠释魅力的：利用快手短视频软件模版催生出一个个自我镜像般的颜值担当，挪用八卦杂志和政治宣传标语而设计成自出版小册子，选取经典铜质胸像雕塑来丰碑化他自己的个人形象，取材于社会经济分工和职业焦虑的全新摄影系列刻板印象了一切，以及转译特定时代的集体主义美学而炮制出企业大佬“诚安哥”这一令人迷惑的形象。最终，几个探讨不同文化议题的系列作品在本次展览里因为艺术家的个人形象而彼此交织起来。
面对这些作品，每一个人都会产生自己的兴趣和解读。而我更想追问的是，艺术家是不是一面镜子？夏诚安是不是记录今天图像生态的单镜头反光相机呢？他的作品是不是关于魅力本身的图像处理器呢？他的形象是真的么，还是一具空壳？
在有意为之的眼花缭乱的布展陈设里，夏诚安反对了时下流行的“少就是多”的知识精英风格与“高冷”的时尚达人风格，他意在玩味图像所蕴含的信息，也利用他的作品去诠释摄影的可能性。夏诚安在自主设置的情景中不断强调他的哲学——一种大道至繁的魅力。
—— 文 王懿泉
《夏诚安：人造魅力》参与2022年集美·阿尔勒国际摄影摄影节发现奖单元评选
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所有这些有关魅力的种种行为与表达，在今天时代的媒介洪流中，往往都不是以著书立说的方式被传播的，而是以图像的逻辑被制造、显示、营销。抑或静态，抑或动态。更值得注意的是，这些魅力图像的生产机制通常不是采用经典的摄影方法，在社交媒体语境下，更加通俗的处理方式是：下载，截屏，转发，修图，美颜，拼贴，挪用，模因（Meme）。这些动作都与经典的依赖光学元件的图像制造设备的逻辑有着本质不同——它们跳过了图像生产而进入到了图像消费。这种图像制造方式简化了或者干脆省略了摄影原本所需的前期和摄制工作，而沉浸在后期。并且，这种后期也与传统意义上的后期并不相同，在我看来这是一种“后后期”。
今天，在魅力的驱动下，这一“后后期”转向塑造了当下的图像制造生态。图像的制造者和观看者保持着一种默契，他们忽略现实而只想看到一种幻想。图像在魅力的裹挟下演化成了魅惑，一种消费主义般的困惑。在这个进程中，我们见证的一个重要事实即是艺术家的缺席。这种以图像为内容的基于移动设备和社交网络的图像生态，与在它之前出现的种种图像生态相比，截然不同。从前，专业的视觉艺术群体才是图像的最重要生产者，比如画家和摄影师。特别是在今日中国，此种图像生态中最为领先的和最具影响力的参与者反而是善于营销也深谙流量密码的网红，及其背后的公司即营销机构MCN。这种大规模的图像制造在满足大众传播各参与方需求的同时，也正在演变成一种“套路”化的魅力。
反观上述的种种现象，拥有视觉传达设计背景的夏诚安，选择了一种特立独行的艺术实践，他在创作中混合了平面设计师应用视觉文化的能力与当代艺术家解构经济社会的愿景。夏诚安不是以高雅文化（high culture）为策略，选择对大流行般的图像生态视而不见，而是有态度地参与其中。
夏诚安亲自下场的方式是将他自己的个人视觉形象暴露无遗，用摄影、观念艺术、计算机图像和数字后期技术来制造一种对自我的迷恋。在个展《夏诚安：人造魅力》中，我们可以进一步看到他是如何制造图像进而诠释魅力的：利用快手短视频软件模版催生出一个个自我镜像般的颜值担当，挪用八卦杂志和政治宣传标语而设计成自出版小册子，选取经典铜质胸像雕塑来丰碑化他自己的个人形象，取材于社会经济分工和职业焦虑的全新摄影系列刻板印象了一切，以及转译特定时代的集体主义美学而炮制出企业大佬“诚安哥”这一令人迷惑的形象。最终，几个探讨不同文化议题的系列作品在本次展览里因为艺术家的个人形象而彼此交织起来。
面对这些作品，每一个人都会产生自己的兴趣和解读。而我更想追问的是，艺术家是不是一面镜子？夏诚安是不是记录今天图像生态的单镜头反光相机呢？他的作品是不是关于魅力本身的图像处理器呢？他的形象是真的么，还是一具空壳？
在有意为之的眼花缭乱的布展陈设里，夏诚安反对了时下流行的“少就是多”的知识精英风格与“高冷”的时尚达人风格，他意在玩味图像所蕴含的信息，也利用他的作品去诠释摄影的可能性。夏诚安在自主设置的情景中不断强调他的哲学——一种大道至繁的魅力。
—— 文 王懿泉
《夏诚安：人造魅力》参与2022年集美·阿尔勒国际摄影摄影节发现奖单元评选
How to enhance one’s charm? Today, opinion leaders and Internet celebrities with five thousand to fifty thousand or even five million followers on global social media constantly pass on their tips for enhancing charisma. Content ranging from skincare, fitness, and nail care that improve one’s appearance to foreign language learning, etiquette training, and psychological healing that discover one's "inner beauty", as well as tutorials on a variety of topics, such as creating a persona, making jokes, and increasing one's leadership.
In the present-day media ecology, such behaviours and expressions about charisma are usually not spread through written words but are created, displayed, and promoted in the logic of images, either still or in motion. It is even more noteworthy that these charismatic images are not produced via traditional photography, but processed through downloading, screenshots, reposting, photoshop, collage, appropriation, and creating memes in the context of social media. These actions of acquiring images are fundamentally different from that via classical image making devices that rely on optical components—they directly jump into image consumption without the process of image production. This image making methods have been simplified or just simply ignored the pre-production and shooting steps and focused on post-production. Moreover, this post-production is different from what it used to be in the traditional sense, as it is a “post post-production”.
Nowadays, driven by charisma, the turn to “post post-production” has shaped the current image making ecology. The common ground shared between the image creator, and the viewer is that they are looking for fantasy rather than reality. The images that are wrapped by charm become more and more seductive, like a siren's song, sung by consumerism. An important feature of this process is the absence of the artist, as the image-making ecology based on mobile devices and social networks is very different from what it used to be. In the past, professional visual artists, such as painters and photographers, were the most important image makers. Today, especially in nowadays China, the leading and the most influential image makers are internet celebrities and the powerful MCN companies behind them, who are very good at promoting and boosting traffic. While feeding all ends in the mass communication chain, this massive image-making mechanism is turning charisma into cliché.
In response to the above phenomena, Xia Chengan, who has a background in visual communication design, combines the graphic designer's ability to apply visual culture with the contemporary artist's visionary deconstruction of the economy and society. Instead of strategically residing in the high culture and ignoring the stream of images bombarding from all around, Xia chose to participate in it with his own attitude.
Xia Chengan chooses to expose his personal visual identity by creating self-obsession through photography, conceptual art, computational imaging, and digital post-production. In his solo exhibition Xia Chengan: Artificial Charisma, we can further see how he interprets charisma by constructing images: filtered selfies generated through Kuaishou (China's second-largest short video app) templates; self-published brochures that appropriate the design of gossip magazines and propaganda slogans; classic bronze busts that idolizing the artist’s own character; the artist’s new series that draws from the stereotyped images of the socioeconomic division of labour and career anxiety; as well as the confusing character ‘Master Xia’, who’s identity is transplanted from the collectivist aesthetics of a specific era. Starting with the artist’s self-portrait, a series of works that explore different cultural phenomena intertwined with each other in this exhibition.
Every viewer can interpret these artworks in their own ways. However, I would like to raise several questions: is the artist a mirror? Is Xia Chengan the single-lens camera that captures our time and reflects the image ecology? Are his works the graphics processing units of “charisma”? Is his character real, or just an empty gesture?
In the deliberately dazzling display and installation, Xia Chengan opposes the popular "less is more" intellectual elite style and the "ice-code" fashionista style. He plays with the information implied in the images and attempts to reinterpret the possibilities of photography through his works. In this self-designed scenario, Xia Chengan constantly emphasises his “more is more” philosophy—the ultimately complicated charisma.
In the present-day media ecology, such behaviours and expressions about charisma are usually not spread through written words but are created, displayed, and promoted in the logic of images, either still or in motion. It is even more noteworthy that these charismatic images are not produced via traditional photography, but processed through downloading, screenshots, reposting, photoshop, collage, appropriation, and creating memes in the context of social media. These actions of acquiring images are fundamentally different from that via classical image making devices that rely on optical components—they directly jump into image consumption without the process of image production. This image making methods have been simplified or just simply ignored the pre-production and shooting steps and focused on post-production. Moreover, this post-production is different from what it used to be in the traditional sense, as it is a “post post-production”.
Nowadays, driven by charisma, the turn to “post post-production” has shaped the current image making ecology. The common ground shared between the image creator, and the viewer is that they are looking for fantasy rather than reality. The images that are wrapped by charm become more and more seductive, like a siren's song, sung by consumerism. An important feature of this process is the absence of the artist, as the image-making ecology based on mobile devices and social networks is very different from what it used to be. In the past, professional visual artists, such as painters and photographers, were the most important image makers. Today, especially in nowadays China, the leading and the most influential image makers are internet celebrities and the powerful MCN companies behind them, who are very good at promoting and boosting traffic. While feeding all ends in the mass communication chain, this massive image-making mechanism is turning charisma into cliché.
In response to the above phenomena, Xia Chengan, who has a background in visual communication design, combines the graphic designer's ability to apply visual culture with the contemporary artist's visionary deconstruction of the economy and society. Instead of strategically residing in the high culture and ignoring the stream of images bombarding from all around, Xia chose to participate in it with his own attitude.
Xia Chengan chooses to expose his personal visual identity by creating self-obsession through photography, conceptual art, computational imaging, and digital post-production. In his solo exhibition Xia Chengan: Artificial Charisma, we can further see how he interprets charisma by constructing images: filtered selfies generated through Kuaishou (China's second-largest short video app) templates; self-published brochures that appropriate the design of gossip magazines and propaganda slogans; classic bronze busts that idolizing the artist’s own character; the artist’s new series that draws from the stereotyped images of the socioeconomic division of labour and career anxiety; as well as the confusing character ‘Master Xia’, who’s identity is transplanted from the collectivist aesthetics of a specific era. Starting with the artist’s self-portrait, a series of works that explore different cultural phenomena intertwined with each other in this exhibition.
Every viewer can interpret these artworks in their own ways. However, I would like to raise several questions: is the artist a mirror? Is Xia Chengan the single-lens camera that captures our time and reflects the image ecology? Are his works the graphics processing units of “charisma”? Is his character real, or just an empty gesture?
In the deliberately dazzling display and installation, Xia Chengan opposes the popular "less is more" intellectual elite style and the "ice-code" fashionista style. He plays with the information implied in the images and attempts to reinterpret the possibilities of photography through his works. In this self-designed scenario, Xia Chengan constantly emphasises his “more is more” philosophy—the ultimately complicated charisma.
——Article by Wang Yiquan
“Xia Chengan: Artificial Charisma“ was nominated to
2022 Jimei-Arles International Photo Festival Discovery Award
