近期艺术家曾浩的创作有重要的转向，创作脉络由当代人文的社会学转向未来艺术学，曾浩将重构人文世、科学世与自然世的新型关系作为多重宇宙想象的支点，只有重构一种新型关系才能解决终极的问题。其新的作品在后人类虚拟世界与现实世界建构了一种新的平衡关系，这样的重构光鲜灿烂背后其实表现一种反乌托邦式的虚幻感，宏观视角的真理必然与科学有关，这三者的关系也是乌托邦与反乌托邦主义的较量，原宇宙与元宇宙的转换关系。

曾浩是60年代出生的艺术家，这个年代的艺术家对于时代、历史的变革历历在目，他亲身目睹了10年的动荡、经历当代的改革开放到未来科技的日常化、军事化和政治化的变迁，这个时代的人对世界格局的重构极其敏感，由冷战到后殖民、全球化、消费化再到贸易战、科技战的残酷性，曾浩持悲观态度，生态、道德、人性、伦理在意识形态的支配下逐渐走向失控。艺术家用玻璃与泡沫的质感，隐喻乌托邦主义的幻灭，只有重构人文、宗教、科学、自然的关系，才能在矛盾中共生。站在世界格局的角度，消除狭隘的民族主义及各自为政的地缘政治，认识到贪婪权贵的集权意识会毁掉世界和人类，重构未来的关系不是粉饰未来，而是反思未来。

曾浩将对未来的虚构和预设称为“幻像”，有魔幻、幻灭的多重之意，我更多的称其为“多重宇宙的幻象”。因为关于幻象的特征，在超现实主义时期，艺术家以潜意识梦境来表现真实的主观性成为历史；后来在当代艺术中将社会与历史现象进行重构，复杂荒诞的社会差异性思潮被称为魔幻现实主义；而未来艺术的多重宇宙可理解为人类借用科学手段去延展时间、空间和新的思维维度，增加了平行的元宇宙维度，比如原宇宙与元宇宙的虚实关系中加入了两者交叉的多元重合的宇宙形态。因为科学在当下与未来的爆发，将未来延展至宇宙太空，将艺术也延展至宇宙太空，形成了太空艺术。

曾浩新的系列作品中多以宇宙太空作为背景，试图重置自然、宗教、科学、人文、社会的新型关系。其作品符号与观念归纳如下：一、运用多重暗物质空间、黑洞、引力波、数字虚拟的构成空间、泡影重置成新。重构自然中物理空间与大爆炸、鸟、光、星球、晶体、能量块、异形泡沫、水的本源，试图表达对宇宙本源的再现与新的探索：未来星际殖民、基因突变与多维度物理空间的发现，如时光穿梭、引力波重构了原来线性演化与中心化的宇宙世界。其实我们未来时空是平行的与重叠的，也可以相互转换，犹如爱因斯坦相对论所发现的爆炸性理论一样，生物伦理、时空幻象等黑科技给人类带来了前所未有的恐惧感和荒诞感。这样的恐惧是现实日常现象中所没有的，同时具有陌生感，让我们看到了人类的渺小；人工化世界在自然面前显得如此的渺小，让我们不要试图过度改变自然生态，发现服务于人类、顺应自然的新的规律，追求天人合一、人机合一等观念基础上追求至乐。二、《幻像》系列中的多维宇宙中还重构了现代城市与未来的关系，比如人类行为、战斗机、钻石、监控器、未来都市、数字化符号、权柄、不明飞行物、人工智能机器的幻像，隐喻未来世界战争、权力控制和城市化的扩张。三、未来基因编辑与人工智能将带给我们新的伦理冲击，改变了自然进化论和神创论的根基，被重构的生物克隆人、机器人、数字人永生给未来宗教以颠覆性打击，因此曾浩作品中不断出现基督、天使、《最后晚餐》、《最后审判》的符号与场景，将会打破人类的继承的价值观，创新和重构一个矛盾与共生的多重宇宙。

人类经历了自然世、人类世，正在转向未来的科学世，然而科技带来的利弊具有很多的不确定性和双刃剑特征。人类越来越倾向科学的研究是因为人文学科中单向的社会学、人类学涉及的人类至上的权利欲望的价值观，可能最终以失败告终，而人类尊重自然和科学的融合，是未来解决人类未来生存危机的重要途径。当然，科学与自然的发展方向都必然与人类相关，所以未来世界的自然世、科学世，与人类必然融合，未来的艺术也必然将科技与自然融合，不应该是科学主义取代人文主义与自然主义，而是将三者融合与相互转换，缺一不可，去掉每个领域都有缺失之处。如果人类只重科技必然人文自然生态缺失，只重人文、科技也会造成自然生态报复，只重自然的原始性也必然愚昧野蛮，文明和真相就得不到补充，因此三者不可缺一。

如果说曾浩以前的作品借用“泡影”作为观念表达的符号，大概分为三个线索：一是他运用行为、装置艺术媒介体验自己吹出的气泡的幻灭感觉，表达泡沫的脆弱与稍纵的生命寓言性；二是作品表现社会泡沫化的虚幻现象与真相，如浮华的泡沫经济，看似晶莹剔透的假象背后隐藏着不可告人的糜烂想象；三是借用大肚腩隐喻人性的贪欲和暴发户似的媚俗之气，这样有形与无形的泡影与欲望直接而概念性的表达，是作者对当代生存感受的反应，是当代艺术典型的批判性表达方式。

然而曾浩说自己以前的作品有些简单，这是一种自省的态度，他对于自己作品不断地反思与更新，我找其原因觉得有这几个方面：对于曾浩以前作品观念的表达时有些概念化，再加上受到国内艳俗、玩世现实主义以及政治波普艺术的影响，其符号语言中造型与色彩都有这样的气质，虽然曾浩的深入而执着的探索，但很容易陷入现实文化、艺术史、集体无意识塑造的泥潭，忽视更具创造性、敏锐性与独立性的发现。艺术史中关于泡泡、灿烂大笑等消费欲望表达的作品还是比较多，不论文化、艺术一定要在受到其影响中逃离它，要感受比其他艺术家敏感的事物才能创造和创新。从媒介、技术、语言、符号、观念上找到区别于他人新的困惑，源于历史与当下而预设未来的警示性，由未来启示当下，具有不同于其它时代的文化针对性，以当代人的视角给予未来、历史、现实以新的诠释和认知，既是个人的又是当下、未来时代的感受，把个人创作脉络放在艺术史脉络中去判断其价值，因此曾浩近两年开始转型为关注未来的《幻像与虚构》系列作品。

曾浩说他以前作品源于沙特的“存在与虚无”思想，对于现代主义时期哲学理性而宏大的叙事特征具有经典性和永恒性，就像中国经典传统哲学中“有形与无形”、“阴阳无常”的转换一样成为普遍的事物规律，也包涵着我们人类面对虚无时存在的意义，东方哲学的虚空、空无的思想让我们放下贪嗔痴的执念寻找逍遥或宁静的心境，其虚实也是相互转换的，这也是多重宇宙的形态，一直追求虚无也是一种极端，因为虚无背后还是要追求存在的意义。因此要看清真相置之死地而后生，让我们从消极中获得积极的能量而重生，这也是东方哲学中的价值。 虚实关系就如中国传统文化中的《易经》中阴阳、《中庸》的“物极必反”的道理一样重要，不可以单向极端发展。虚中也会透实，实中有虚，虚实时常同时存在。我们需要以积极心态平衡其利弊价值：虚实同源、相互转换、共生。然而经典的思想需要未来学重构、转换，艺术和文明才能更新与创新，这些是曾浩作品未来学转向的另一个原因。

曾浩的作品除了观念转向，也试图进行未来美学语言的探索。曾浩川美毕业后，曾在广东肇庆学院15年从事教育工作，2005年来北京作为职业艺术家，对于艺术语言和技巧的把握有很强的能力，他将泡影和玻璃质感的膨胀、脆弱和光鲜亮丽背后的社会不确定性得以充分表现。未来美学语言的色彩与消费时代艳俗的色彩不同，未来美学语言相对沉稳，将太空科幻的黑白灰与纯色块搭配；造型也开始异形化，表现多重虚实穿插的空间，具象与抽象构成并置、秩序化与无序化符号结合，质感精致光滑，非表现主义时期的个人情绪化表达。曾浩运用画笔和喷笔结合的绘画手法诠释了未来语言的气质，运用传统媒介画出数字艺术的语言特征，这也打破了传统艺术媒介的界限，让传统媒介焕发出新的活力，也证明了传媒媒介的创造性。当然对于未来学的探索，曾浩还刚刚起步，未来学还有很多的观念还有待深入挖掘，不过他能够大胆触碰新的敏感地带已经难能可贵。

2022年3月18日于北京通州

Multiverse: Reconstruction of the World of Human，Nature, and Science

Turning and Reflection of Zeng Hao the Artist on Futurology

By Zhang Haitao

Keywords: Future, Reconstruction of the World of Human, Nature, and Science, Visions of Multiverse, Reconstruction of Future, Contradiction and Consensus, Disillusion of Utopianism, Phantom and Fiction, Pessimistic Anti-utopianism

Important turnings can be seen in the recent works of Zeng Hao the artist whose focus of creation has turned from sociology reflecting contemporary humanity to future art. Taking the reconstruction of new type of relationship among the world of human, science, and nature, as the fulcrum driving multiverse imagination, Zeng Hao believed that no ultimate problem could be solved unless a new type of relationship can be reconstructed. His new works established a new balance between the post-human virtual world and the real world. As for this reconstruction, what stands behind its glossy appearance is actually a sense of anti-utopian visions, while the truth under macroscopic prospective is definitely associated with science. The relationship among the three is exactly the fight between utopianism and anti-utopianism, and the conversion between primary universe and metaverse.

Born in the 1960s, Zeng Hao witnessed the evolution of the time and changes of the history. He has seen with his own eyes the turbulent decade and the routine, military, and political transition from the time of reform and opening-up to the future science and technology. People living through this time are extremely sensitive to the reconstruction of the world. From the cold war to the post-colony, globalization, and consumerization, and then the cruelty of trade war and science war, Zeng Hao is always pessimistic, witnessing the gradual downgrading of ecology, morality, humanity, and ethics under the control of ideology. By using the texture of glass and foams, Zeng implied the disillusion of utopianism and believed that no co-existence of humanity, religion, science, and the nature is possible in contradictions unless a new type of relationship can be built. Standing at the angle of the whole world, Zeng realized that the greedy pursuit for power centralization would finally destroy the world and the human and we need to eliminate the narrow nationalism and fragmented geopolitics. This reconstruction is not to whitewash the future, but to rethink about the future.

Zeng Hao described the fiction and prediction on the future as “illusion”, which means a lot like magic and disillusion, while in my opinion, it is more like “the illusion of multiverse”. Because of the features of illusion, the subjective behavior that artists applied subliminal dreams to reflect the real world in the era of super-realism is consigned to the history; later in the era of contemporary art, social phenomenons and historical phenomenons were restructured, while complex and absurd thoughts of social differences being identified as magic realism. As for art in the future, multiverse can be treated as a fact that human use science to extend the dimension of time, space, and new thoughts, which prolongs dimensions of the parallel metaverse. For example, multiply coincident universe forms featured with the interaction of primary universe and metaverse are added into the virtual relationship between such primary universe and metaverse. The explosion of science today and in the future has extended the future into the universe space, so it is with the art, and space art takes shape finally.

In most of his new series of works, Zeng Hao tried to build new relationships among nature, religion, science, humanity, and the society, by taking the universe space as background. Symbols and ideas reflected in his works can be summarized as follows: 1) Bubbles and spaces made of multiple dark material space, black hole, gravitational wave, and digital virtual worlds are used to rebuild physical spaces and sources of explosions, birds, light, celestial bodies, crystals, energy cells, heteroideus bubbles, and water, trying to show the reproduction of and new exploration to the source of universe. The discovery of star colonies in the future, gene mutation, and multi-dimensional physical spaces, like the time-space shuttles and gravitational waves, has reconstructed the former universe featured with linear evolution and centralization. In the fact, the time and space in the future are parallel to, overlapped and changeable with each other, just like the explosive theories identified from Einstein Theory.

Black science and technology, like bioethics, and space-time illusions, have brought unprecedented sensor of fear and sense of absurdity. This fear is new in our real daily life, and sounds strange, enabling people to be aware of the insignificance of human. In front of the nature, the artificialized world is so tiny that we shall never try to change the natural ecology but just to pursue for ultimate happiness on the premise of identifying new laws which can serve people without violating the nature and complying the thoughts for co-existence between the human and the nature and between the human and the machine. 2) In the multiverse reflected in the Illusion series, relationship between the modern city and the future is rebuilt, such as illusions of human actions, warcrafts, diamonds, monitors, future cities, digitalized symbols, powers, UFOs, AI machines, implying world wars in the future and the expansion of power control and urbanization. 3) In the future, gene editing and AI will bring new ethic attacks to the human, which will further challenge the theory of natural evolutionism and the foundation of creationism. Rebuilt clone men, robots, and immortal digital human will shock the religion subversively in the future. Therefore, in Zeng Hao’s works, symbols and scenes like the Jesus, the angel, the last supper, and the last judgement can be seen again and again in Zeng Hao’s works, which will then break the values adhered by the human for thousands of years and re-construct and rebuild a contradictory but co-existing multiverse.

The human has gone through the era of nature, the Anthropocene, and now turning to the future era of science. However, the pros and cons of science and technology show great uncertainty like a double-edged sword. The reason why more and more people prefer scientific research is that values which reflect the desire for powers and the idea of human first and involved in the unidirectional sociology and anthropology in humanities will probably lead to failure, while the respect of human toward the nature and science is an important way to solve the survival crisis of human in the future. Of course, both science and nature will develop in a direction associate with the human, therefore, the world of nature and the world of science in the future will definitely integrate with the human, and the future art will for sure integrate with science and nature. It is not simply that scientism will replace humanism and naturalism, but that the three will be integrated and converted with each other, none can be dispensed with, or otherwise deficiencies will be generated. If the human emphasize science only, the natural and humanity ecologies will be deficient, or if emphasize humanity and science, revenge will take place in the nature, or the human will become ignorant and barbarous if emphasize the nature only and civilization and the real world will be deficient. That is, none of the three can be omitted.

In his former works, Zeng Hao took “bubbles” as a symbol to express his opinions. Three clues can be found generally: 1) He used behaviors and installation art media to feel the breaking of bubbles blown by him so that to reflect the weakness of bubbles and the fleeting life; 2) His works implied the bubble-like phenomenon and reality, just like the flashy bubble economy which looks glittering but holds erosive imaginations which could not be disclosed; 3) Big bellies are used to metaphor the greedy desire of human and the vulgar of nouveau riches; this direct and conceptual expression between bubbles and desires, tangible and intangible, is the author’s response to the contemporary life and a typical critical expression of contemporary art.

However, Zeng Hao thought his former workers were simple to some extent. This is an introspective attitude reflecting his constant reflection and renewal on his works. I think reasons are as follows: in the former works of Zeng Hao, some ideas were expressed in a conceptual way. Together with the influence of raffish, cynical realism, and political pop art atmosphere in China, both shapes and colors in Zeng’s symbolic languages were influenced. Although Zeng explored profoundly and persistently, he was likely to get trapped in the realistic culture, art history, and collective unconscious creation, and finally ignored more creative, sensitive, and independent findings. Lot of works focusing on bubbles, brilliant laughs and other consuming desire expressions can be found in the history of art, both cultural and artistic works need to escape the influence on them and get more sensitive feelings than other artists, or otherwise creation and creativity will be impossible. New puzzles different from those identified by other people shall be identified from media, techniques, language, symbols, and ideas, and warnings shall be made toward the future based on situations in the past and current days, and finally get inspired from the future. We need to deliver, in our works, cultural pertinence different from works of other eras, and give brand-new interpretations and perceptions to the future, the past, and the reality, from the modern perspective, making it the feelings of both ourselves and all the people of the modern and the future generations. We need to put our personal creations in the whole world of art to tell their values. It is for these reasons that in recent years, Zeng Hao switched and started his collections of Illusions and Fictions focusing on the future.

Zeng Hao said his former works were inspired from the “being and nothingness” idea in the Saudi Arabia which is classical and persistent in front of the rational and grand narrative features of philosophy of the modernism age, just like the conversion between “tangible and intangible” and “Yin and Yang the two opposing principles” in the classical philosophy of China. It is a general law of the things and contains the significance of human’s existence toward nothingness. The idea of voidness and emptiness in the Oriental philosophy tell us to give up the obsessions of desire, anger, and craziness but to seek for free, unhurried or peaceful mind. This kind of virtuality and reality are changeable and they are forms of the multiverse. The persistent pursuit for emptiness is an extreme because we need to find the significance of existence behind emptiness. Therefore, we need to identify the reality and then get birth from the death and finally get positive energy from negativity, and this is the value advocated by the Oriental philosophy. The relationship between virtuality and reality is just like that between Yin and Yang in the Book of Changes and the theory of “things will develop in the opposite direction when they become extreme” declared in the Doctrine of the Mean, both are masterpieces of Chinese cultural tradition. No extreme development in a single direction is allowed. Reality exists in illusion, and emptiness can be found in existence and the two co-exist all the time. We need to balance pros and cons with a positive mind: both virtuality and reality share the same origin and they are changeable and co-exist all the time. Nevertheless, classical thoughts need to be reconstructed and converted with future science, or art and civilization could hardly be renewed or innovated, this tells another reason why Zeng Hao’s works switched to future science.

In addition to the turning in concept, Zeng Hao also tried to explore future aesthetic languages. After graduating from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Zeng Hao had worked in the field of education for 15 years in Zhaoqing University in Guangdong Province. He came to Beijing in 2005, as a professional artist and showed strong capability in the using of artistic language and skills. He expressed fully the social uncertainties behind the expansion, glittering, and weakness of bubbles and glass textures. Future aesthetic languages show colors different from the vulgar colors of the consumption times. Future aesthetic languages are relatively stable, represented by the mixing of black, white, grey, and other solid-color blocks; the shapes are heteromorphic, showing the spaces made of multiple virtuality and reality; both concrete and abstract compositions are applied, while orderly and disorderly symbols are combined, making the texture exquisite and smoothy, different from the personal emotional expression of the expressionism period. By jointly using the paint brush and the air brush, Zeng Hao illustrated the temperament of future languages and delivered the linguistic features of digital art with traditional media. This has broken the boundary of traditional artistic medium, making traditional medium show new vitality. It proved also the creativity of traditional medium. Of course, Zeng Hao has just started his journey toward the exploration of future science and there are lots of concepts to be discovered. Even though, it is already rare and recommendable for him to try and explore this new and sensitive field.

Tongzhou, Beijing, March 18, 2022;