英語視頻暢談歐美人文風情45：委拉斯奎茲的《宮女》

We're in the Prado in Madrid, and we're looking at the great canvas by Velázquez, Las Meninas.

我們在馬德里的普拉多美術館，我們正在看委拉斯奎茲所創(chuàng)作的偉大油畫《宮女》。

Did you mean "great" in terms of size? Because it is a very large painting.

你是說在尺寸方面的“偉大”嗎?因為這是一幅非常大的畫作。

Actually, it's a painting with a very large painting inside it.

事實上，這是一幅有著非常巨大畫作在其中的畫作。

That's the same size as the painting it is.

那是和畫作本身相同的尺寸。

In fact, some art historians have suggested that the painting that Velázquez (because notice there is a self-portrait of Velázquez in the act of painting) is, in fact, painting the painting that we're looking at. Did you follow that?

事實上，有些藝術史學家提出委拉斯奎茲的畫作(因為注意這里有個維拉斯奎茲正進行繪畫動作的自畫像)事實上，是在畫出那幅我們正在欣賞的畫作。你有跟上嗎?

I did. It is very complicated. So what we're seeing here is, in the center, the princess attended by the maids of honor, a dwarf, her governess, and some other attendants; and on the back wall a mirror, which is the sort of puzzle in a way of the painting.

我有跟上。這是非常複雜的。所以我們在這兒看到的是，在中央，公主讓宮女、一個侏儒、她的女家教、還有一些其他的侍者所服侍;在后方墻上有面鏡子，那有點像關于那畫作的謎團。

We know it's a mirror because unlike the canvases on the back wall, this is a much more reflective surface. We can see the beveled edge of the glass, and of course in that frame, we see a reflection of the King and Queen of Spain, Philip IV and his wife.

我們知道那是面鏡子，因為不像在后墻上的油畫，這是一個更加反光的表面。我們可看到玻璃的斜邊，還有當然在那畫框中，我們看到西班牙國王及皇后的映像--肺力四世及他的妻子。

And some art historians have suggested that we must be them looking into the mirror and seeing our own reflection. Others have suggested that, in fact, the mirror is reflecting the image that is being depicted on the canvas by Velázquez.

有些藝術史學家提出，我們一定就是他們，望進那鏡子并看到我們自己的映像。其他的人提議，事實上，那鏡子正倒映出由委拉斯奎茲描繪在畫布上的影像。

And then even other art historians have suggested, yes, the mirror is reflecting what's on the canvas, but the King and Queen are still standing before us, which is why the princess is looking out at us, and even the dog is, in a sense, taking notice.

接著甚至還有其他藝術史學家建議，是的，那鏡子正映出在畫布上的東西，但國王和皇后仍站在我們面前，這也是為什么公主正向外看著我們，甚至那狗在某種意義上也注意到了。

And why there is sort of just general attention being very much focused on where we are in front of the painting. Perhaps we're in the space of the King and Queen, and this painting was meant for the study of the King, who would have been the person looking at it. So it's very much meant for his gaze.

也是為什么這里就有點大眾的注意力非常多數(shù)集中在我們在畫作前的位置。也許我們就在國王和皇后的位置，而這幅畫是預計要描摹國王，國王原本會是要看它的那個人。所以它很大部分是預計要讓他仔細端詳。

That issue of looking, of gaze, is I think for me really one of the central keys to this painting. It seems to me to be a conversation of glances, a conversation of people reacting to each other's glances, of looking itself, a kind of essay on the way in which we see.

那注視的議題、凝視的議題，我認為對我來說確實是這幅畫作的中心關鍵之一。這對我而言看似一個視線的對話、一段人們對于彼此視線反應的對話、眼神它本身的對話，一種我們看的方式的嘗試。

To me it's more of paying attention.

對我來說更像是去注意。

I think that's exactly right, and that would make sense. This is the King and Queen of Spain, one of the most powerful countries on the face of the Earth at this moment.

我覺得那完全沒錯，那也講的通。這是西班牙國王和皇后，在當時地球表面上最強大的國家之一。

Yeah, you'd have to pay attention to them if they walked in the room.

是的，如果他們走進那房間，你必須要注意到他們。

You would ignore them at your own peril.

你忽略他們就要自負后果。

Exactly.

沒錯。

And we can see it when we see the artist, Velázquez, who is first painter to the King looking out to the royal couple. He would have had, of course, the best job that an artist could have in Spain at this moment. I'm interested, though, in the sort of sense of naturalism, the sense of spontaneity, the sense of informality, which is so unexpected in a royal portrait.

我們可以理解，當我們看到那藝術家，委拉斯奎茲，他是國王的第一個畫家，向皇室夫婦那頭望去。當然，他會擁有當時西班牙的藝術家所能擁有最棒的工作。但是，我對那種自然主義感很有興趣、對那種自發(fā)感、不拘禮節(jié)感很有興趣，那是在皇室肖像中非常出乎意料的。

That's the amazing thing about this painting, I think. It's that makes it so hard to say what it is and makes it so compelling. It's that it's not a portrait. Because we know what portraits look like. They're on the walls all around us.

那是有關這幅畫很神奇的事，我認為。就是那讓它很難去解釋那是什么，且讓它如此吸引人們注意。就是那不是一幅肖像。因為我們知道肖像看起來是什么樣子。它們在我們周遭的墻上。

And they're very formal portraits of the royal family kind of posing and looking powerful, and that's not what this is. So there is a kind of informality, like a genre painting, like we're looking at something like a day in the life of the painter's studio, but that's not what it is, either, because it is also a portrait. So it sort of straddles this weird line of being both those things.

它們是非常正式的皇室家族肖像，有點非常有力地擺姿勢和凝視，那不是這幅畫的樣子。所以有種不拘禮節(jié)的感覺，像是一幅風俗畫，像是我們在看著某個像是畫家的工作室生活中的一天，但那也不是這幅畫的內容，因為它同樣也是一幅肖像。所以它有點跨越那條同時是那兩件事的怪異線條。

It's like the intimate portrait. It's a portrait that gives you a kind of access to, in a sense, the real moment, the real life within this palace. In fact, some art historians have suggested that the painting is, in part, a way for the artist to promote himself and to show his importance and, in a sense, his value to the court.

那像是私人肖像。這是一幅畫，那給了你一種，從某種意義上來看，通往現(xiàn)實時刻的準許、通往這座宮殿中現(xiàn)實生活的準許。事實上，有些藝術歷史學家提出這幅畫某方面是讓藝術家推銷他自己的一種方式，還有顯示出他的重要性以及，從某種意義上，顯示他對宮廷的價值的方式。

The idea that as a painter, he's not just a craftsman, but an intellectual. So here's the irony.If Velázquez is, in a sense, trying to support this notion of the artist as intellectual, and not the craftsman, not the man who works with his hands, the painting is a bravura example of painting.

身為一名畫家，他不只是個工藝師，而是一位知識分子這種想法。所以這里是諷刺的地方。如果委拉斯奎茲在某種意義上試著要去支持這個藝術家是知識分子，而不是工藝師、不是用他的雙手干活的人這個概念，這幅畫就是一幅花俏畫作的范例。

We can never get away from the fact that this is fantastic painting; because although there is a tremendous sense of naturalism amongst these figures, the painting is also nothing but a series of strokes of paint.

我們永遠無法擺脫這個是驚人畫法的事實;因為雖然在這些人物之間有種強烈的自然主義感，但這幅畫同時也不過就是一系列顏料的線條。

And I think that's most vividly witnessed in the sleeves of La Infanta, of her attendants, or especially that lightning bolt of a stroke of white that goes down the artist's own sleeve and actually leads our eye to the palette.

我認為那在La Infanta的袖子上、在她侍者的袖子上最清楚看見，或是特別是從藝術家自己的袖子往下的那道閃電狀的白色線條，且確實將我們的眼睛引到調色板上。

And here's this sort of most wonderful conundrum. The palette is a representation in space of the raw paint, which is, of course, the very stuff that the artist is using to create the depiction of the thing that it is.

這里是這種最迷人的難題。那調色板是那未干顏料范圍內的代表，當然，正是那藝術家用來創(chuàng)造出那事物本身描繪的工具。

What I find so interesting, though, also, is that there is a time when the reverse happens. Look at the way that his hand holds the paint brush. That is raw paint that almost dissolves, that almost refuses to be fingers on a hand. So that he's in a sense playing on that edge.

然而，我同樣發(fā)現(xiàn)很有趣的，是有一段當相反事物發(fā)生的時間?？纯此氖治兆‘嫻P的方式。那是幾乎要融化的未干顏料、幾乎不愿成為手上的指頭的未干顏料。所以在某種意義上來說他正在那邊緣間玩弄。

I can make very loose strokes of the brush, feel clarified and come together and feel like cloth in motion, right? Reflective light, taffeta, what have you. Or I can actually dissolve forms that you expect and allow the thing to become just the act of painting as well.

我可以畫出非常稀疏的畫筆線條、感受到凈化、并集結起來，且感覺像擺動中的布料，對吧?反射的光線、塔夫綢、還有其他類似的東西。或是我可以確實拆解那你預料中的形式，然后也讓事情變成只是繪畫這個動作。

And I think what adds to this is the fact that we don't see what he's painting. There's a kind of mystery about the alchemy of painting, about how you take medium and solvent and pigment and turn it into reality.

我認為補充說明這個的是我們并沒看見他在畫什么這件事實。有種關于繪畫煉金術的謎團、關于你如何利用材料、溶劑和顏料，并將其變成現(xiàn)實的謎團。

I would say that it's not just reality he's after. I think he's after a kind of condensed reality. I think he's after a kind of heightened experience of looking, a kind of heightened experience of the intimacy of this family, of this moment. And I think that he is doing something that is actually quite poetic and quite philosophical.

我會說這他在追求的不只是事實。我認為他在追求一種壓縮的現(xiàn)實。我認為他在追求一種觀看更高一層的體驗、一種這個家族的親密度、這個時刻更高一層的體驗。我認為他正在做某種確實頗詩意也頗哲學的事情。