Odyssey: Winnowing Oar
Looping Animation, 2015
According to the Odyssey, Winnowing Oar is a prophecy that Odysseus obtained in Tartarus (Acient Greek version of hell). It says when Odysseus finally returns to his homeland, he needs to carry a oar with him and walking inland until he finds a "land that knows nothing of the sea", where the oar would be mistaken for a winnowing fan. At this point, he is to offer a sacrifice to Poseidon, and then at last his journeys would be over. Here I use this mythological story as a metaphor of the border of meaning and understanding. With the ship and dead fish continuously returning on the far horizon, the border of meaning suddenly turns into the line between life and death, here in this video.
这个作品的灵感取材自《奥德赛》中奥德修斯在地狱中获得的预言。预言说，在奥德修斯最终回到故乡之后，他需要带着船桨深入内陆，直到有人将他的船桨误认为扬谷的簸箕，他便要就地把桨就地插在泥土里向波塞冬献祭，以此最终达到与神的和解。我对这个故事着迷是因为这个神秘主义的仪式里暗含了某种探索意义的边界的隐喻。动画里的金鱼船来自于我之前画的一张单幅作品，这个航行于地平线上的载着金鱼尸体货船的图像所隐含的意向，代表了我个人对于生命去向何方的思考。