如果你是一種顏色
Faceless Portraits by Norris Yim
如果每個人都是一種顏色，你有想過自己是什麼顏色？來自香港的抽象畫家 Norris Yim 擅長人像畫，但與一般作品不同，他畫的人一律沒有臉孔。在他的畫里，長相不再是區分一個人的重點，或者說，長相根本不是一個人的重點。他喜歡以色彩去觀看一個人，「每一幅作品用的顏色都不一樣，那團抽象的顏料代表了我當下的感受和情緒，我用自己的心情去認識、和定義畫筆下的每一個人，心情就是我的創作依據。 就算是同樣的人我畫一百次，也會有一百次不一樣的結果。」
If everyone were a color, which one would you be? Hong Kong-based painter Norris Yim specializes in abstract portraits — unlike most portraits, his have no faces. Looks are not a person』s most important distinguishing feature in his art — which is perhaps to say, looks are not what』s important about a person. He likes to view people through color. 「Every work uses different colors. Those abstract pigments represent my current feelings and mood. I use my own mood to get to know and define each person I paint. My mood forms the basis of the work. Even if I painted the same person a hundred times, I』d still get 100 different results.」
畫畫對 Norris Yim 而言，是純粹用來闡述自我的工具，一個從觀看他人、內化到創作靈感的轉變過程。「我一直都是為了自己在畫，求的是個人精神上的滿足，心境上甚至是帶點孤寂的那種。」從小在香港長大，Norris Yim 說自己一直都喜歡創作，儘管途中迂迴了一些，最後依然幸運的走回純藝術的道路上。 「大學時期發現，畫畫是唯一能讓我專註下來，而且渴望一直去做的事。本來只是想多學一門手藝，一碰觸到畫筆，就像意外找回自己許久不見的靈魂。從那時候起，很自然地每天都要動動筆，僅管只是調個顏色也好。就這樣畫畫成了我的基本。」
Painting, for Yim, is purely a means of self-presentation, a process of transforming his observation of others and internalizing it as creative inspiration. 「I』m always painting for myself, and what I seek is my own spiritual satisfaction,」 he says.「But this satisfaction is often tinged with loneliness.」
While Yim has always enjoyed flexing his creative muscles, he never realized how deep his love for art truly was until college. After this self-revelation, art became an essential part of his life. 「In college, I found that painting was the one thing I could concentrate on, the one thing I always wanted to do. At first, I just wanted to take an extra arts course, but when I came into contact with painting, it was like finding my own long-lost soul,」 he recalls.「Ever since then, in a very natural way, I feel I have to pick up a brush every day, even if it』s just to tweak a color. That』s how painting became fundamental for me.」
在人像畫《Portraits》系列裡，人物有些是真實存在，有些是出自憑空幻想。至於他們是誰，也不太重要，因為這些人都只存在在 Norris Yim 的一刻想像里。即使有時候有明確畫的對象，Norris Yim 還是會以《Someone》（《某人》）或《Untitled》（《無題》）來命名，為的是不讓以外的事件碰觸，讓畫純粹作為一個記錄自己心情的工具。
其實往前看他早期的作品，也有臉孔還很清楚的人像畫。之所以轉向現在的表達方式，是因為想脫離那樣局限的創作方法，尋找更多發揮空間。「現在回頭去看過去的作品，總覺得人像感太重，也就是每一個人都可以畫出近似複製的作品，雖然有『人』的結構，卻少了畫者本身的『靈魂』。我不希望以其他人的基準，去限制自己的創作。我常常在想，想像是無限的嗎？這句話就是我一切創作的根本吧。我想從畫和各種顏色里尋找更多可能，關於自我的可能。」
In hisPortraitsseries, some of the subjects are based on real people while others are completely conjured up from the depths of his imagination. Who they are is unimportant, because they exist solely in Yim』s mind. Occasionally, he paints with a specific subject in mind, but even then he』ll often still title the work asSomeoneorUntitled. He does this to avoid any link to the outside world, and to make the painting solely a tool for recording his mood.
Among his early works are some portraits with distinguishable faces. He moved toward his current approach because he wanted his work to be unconstrained and offer more space for creative freedom. 「Looking back at my past pieces, I always think they feel too much like portraits. Anyone can paint a likeness. While the human figure is there, the painter』s soul is missing. I don』t want to limit my own work to someone else』s standards. I』m often asking myself, is my imagination unlimited? This question is the basis of all my art. I want to seek more possibilities in painting and color, more possibilities in myself.」
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