AN INTERNATIONAL POETRY JOURNAL IN ENGLISH & CHINESE
Wood and Shadow: A Dialogue
Woodcuts © Wang Yi
Printmaker and illustrator Wang Yi graduated in 2002 from the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts Printmaking Department. For Guangzhou’s 2014 Poetry and People 9th International Prize, she created a portrait sequence of the current and previous prizewinning poets. Among her honors are the Charles B. Wang Scholarship Award and the Guangdong Printmaking Exhibition Prize. Her woodcuts have been featured at both regional and metropolitan museums in numerous mainland Chinese cities, including Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Shanghai. Her work has also appeared in Penang (Malaysia), Macao, Kyoto, Milan, and at Heidelberg’s Galerie Schillerstrasse.
Whether selected moments from a narrative, abstracted meditations, or portraiture, Wang Yi’s work delivers its energy in sharply expressionistic blacks and whites. Some of these, as social commentary, offer grotesques whose stark power recalls George Grosz’s paintings of interwar Berlin.
王嶷， 版畫家，插畫師，2002年畢業於廣州美術學院版畫系，一直專注木版畫創作和插畫工作。近年來在中國廣州、佛山、澳門特別行政區及德國海德堡等地舉辦個人木刻展覽。2014年，為慶祝詩歌與人國際詩人獎，在廣州舉辦「嘗試讚美這殘缺的世界」詩人肖像版畫展。作品參加第二屆檳城國際版畫展、第六屆京都國際木版畫展、2008年義大利米蘭繪畫展、2005年第十七屆全國版畫展等多個國內外展覽，獲2005年廣東版畫展版畫獎、2002年廣東版畫展銀獎、 2002年廣州美術學院王嘉廉獎學金創作一等獎等，並為多個藝術機構收藏，包括澳門特別行政區政府文化局，廣東美術館，廣州美術學院美術館，深圳何香凝美術館，四川神州版畫博物館，汕頭博物館，貴陽美術館，上海明園文化藝術中心，德國席勒畫廊。
王嶷的木刻創作在內容上相當靈活，從一幀敘事的定格，到抽象的冥想，再到人物肖像，均以一種明烈的表現力傳達出作品蘊含的能量，黑白分明。看那些帶有社會批判性的文學插畫，其中不加掩飾的怪誕，有一股將人直接擊倒的力量，讓觀者不免聯想起德國藝術家喬治·格羅茲畫筆下二戰期間的柏林。木刻是力的藝術，力在王嶷的作品裡是一種控制，一種展示，也是一種存在。
Artist’s Statement
I like to begin work before daybreak. In the hot season, night’s retreat comes with refreshing coolness in the air. When I hear small birds, I know the day’s come and I’m ahead of it.
I approach a woodcut first by sketching, inviting narratives that may lead to an enchanted grove. As the path meanders, I encounter surprises, slowly finding a way past hesitations and dead-ends, all the time considering, reflecting. Sometimes there’s no arrival, only motion. Woodcut is simple, exacting, but not at all obscure. It draws me on, expressing moods and feelings difficult to convey in words.
王嶷：工作手記
喜歡天沒亮開始工作。黑夜退去，慢慢感到空氣的清涼，伴隨幾聲碎碎的鳥叫，知道天亮了，感覺自己走在了時間的前面。
木刻於我是一種表達的方式，一路觀察，一路畫著走來。攝入故事性像魔法一樣把自己驅入一片幻想的森林。前面的路很漫長，也很奇妙，不停向前走才能逐漸清晰自己的方向。會猶豫，會否定，邊走邊思索。也許沒有最終的結論，唯有繼續前行。而木刻本身是簡單，執著，毫不含糊的。我遊走在木刻裡探索，她指引我前進，代替我言語不能表達的情緒和感受。
