我們交換練習對方的母語，再共同移居到異國生活，不時往返此地彼岸。這樣一來一回，語言全都亂了。有些字非得用粵語不可，一時之間找不到代替。稍微恍神，中文奪口而出，連忙用有口音的英文胡混過去。更多時候，明明許多話要講，聲音就卡在喉頭，任嘴唇扭捏卻無法發出語音。氣急敗壞時亂講一些字眼，但耳朵聽到嘴巴的發言，又悔恨辭不達意，辜負了談話的情誼。我看起來一定很蠢。她盡力想要理解我，這在社交談話中并不尋常。為表感激，我藉故潦草結束對話。「茫然地張合嘴巴的寄居者。」1 我大概無法掌握語言了。還是我妄想自己可以一刻不差地被理解？
有一天我說了夢話，醒來他說是粵語。
「暖麗南國多情的孩子，你為甚麼不回家? 」2
「這是長久以來想象和醖釀的結果」，也是「水到渠成」的選擇。3
第一次因護照上的國籍而被邊檢攔下，才恍悟幾個不起眼的小字就是邊界。4 我還以為早已熟稔藉由別人來框定自己是誰：一位女兒、姊妹、妻子、母親，同時是某國國民，和客居異鄉者。在這些關係性的稱謂前，「藝術家」顯得孤身隻影。這個無需倚靠他人就可以自我指認的身份，在命運跌宕時搖搖欲墜。我亦不覺得自己可被叫做「旅人」，更罕有心理空間欣賞風光。5 我清空自己的腦袋，好裝下必需品清單、今日住址與待煮的飯食。試圖在異國生存，好像跟做藝術家勉強維生的景況重疊了。不斷遷移的過程裏，時間、空間與材料皆受限制，於是創作成為某種奢侈。不過，兼顧生存與創作是否從來都是一種奢侈呢？
當生存變成頭等大事，一度以為過不了的難關也不再緊要。聽講早年移民海外的華人，為拿到工作許可，常會謊稱自己年滿十八，再取一個外文名字。移民重新修訂了生命的計數，從此姓名和生日都不再能夠定位這個人。多年來處理檔案，太清楚只有透過檔案的空隙，才能進入具體的生命故事。記得早前一次採訪，朋友的母親回味海上移民之旅時直道「苦澀」。她指的是海風夾雜鹹水的腥氣，暈船嘔吐的膽汁殘餘，還是背井離鄉的心酸滋味？6 後來我也漂泊在外，文檔相簿裝不進行李，只好帶回憶一起上路。沒有物證，逐漸忘了確切的時間。有時記憶恍惚，我懷疑它是真是幻。若一份「檔案」沒有時間、座標或實體，它大概算不上人們口中的「歷史」，卻撐起我生命的重量。那我的生命，究竟是重，還是輕得不值一提？
維特根斯坦說輕（Lightness）是飛鳥而非羽毛。如果輕得可以承載體積、彈性和動能，是否足以用於形容一條生命？形象從陳詞濫調中躍出，觀念從繁瑣事務中釋放，生命經驗在某個剎那被捕捉。因滯留異鄉而多出來的日子裏，飛鳥捉住我的目光。老話講翅膀硬了注定離家，如今看它們在不同城市上空出現，反倒成為熟悉的寄托。在這趟不知何時為止的旅途中，只有變化是恆常不變，事物的意義因之翻轉。就像忘掉「藝術家」這個身分後，「創作」卻回來找我。我在日光下、行走時拍攝，夜晚借燈光剪貼。被稱為作品的事物好像須得有形象、體積或時值。那我姑且叫它習作罷——練習做些甚麼，成為某種抓手。在這些無法期待規律的日常裏，創作不再是錦上添花，而是變回基本需要。它擰出一股力量，將我的日子接住。
像是每次搬屋我習慣添置一些植物，關照另一條生命好讓自己的生命感到有著落。閒來我給植物取人的名字，好似是兒時屋苑的反向命名。「每座大廈都以樹林命名，松、櫚、棉、桃、榆、楠、榕」。7 南來的植物在北國家裏生長，被稱作家的地方可在人造土地上建設。那遷移的人呢？兜兜轉轉幾年，想得到開始，猜不到結局。只好計畫最切近的一小步：起碼被移至展廳裏的植物，展後全數栽種回土地。8 如果把研究、創作、展覽都想成有生命的事物，藝術家大概可做有情人。藝術令我喪失工作與生活的邊界感，我寧願如此——留心周遭、重訪歷史、關心人事，哪有停止之說？人們習慣為事物定立邊界，命名它，從而記住它。身份、性別、媒材、主題。然而被框定的事物，如何用來比擬流動的經驗？人們總以為「影像」是結果，誰知遷移者的生命從來只仰賴「出發」。我向影像縱深處走去，看似轉向場域特定（site-specific）的方法，在現場調動出歷史魂靈、激起情感震顫。難道不是因為人置身於世界之中，即是最生猛的場域特定？9
在路上時，場域是移動的。不只如此，時間、規律和感知都是。唯一可以錨定的便是身體，我用她重新丈量時間、歷史與地理。少年時我反叛，愛將完整的事物打碎，對歷史和性別挑釁，將具體的人變模糊，將靜物從風景中抽出，再將它們和原型並置。如今事物在我面前掠過，甚至來不及捕捉一個完整的畫面就要与它擦身而過。飛鳥從海平線升起，建築從天空下落。放一只名叫海的風箏，今夜的月亮垂下一條線。但更多是留白：天的盡頭不知在哪，樹被樓宇從中間截斷，拿起相機時鳥已經飛遠，影子的主人面目模糊。日子飛快、行色匆匆，我的手在剪貼我的腦袋，而我每天遺忘多一點。你的邏輯在我的圖像面前失效了，但你的身體被我的經驗環繞。這造成某種錯位感：你以為在觀看全新的創造，卻在某個時刻感到似曾相識。我承認自己是多孔的，於是可與你相連。後知後覺，作品幾乎是我的自傳——靜默地操弄著移動中的身體、講著離散的語言。10 你忍不住問我，拼貼是將整全剪碎解構，還是將碎片拼成整全？
對一個撿拾歷史、重講故事的人來說，我們何曾整全過？流離的經驗讓我更能體認，「失去」不是一個個事件，而是每分每秒。當身體開始理解失去的感受，頭腦便開始留意原本不稀罕的事情。少年時不愛讀的本地小說，不願聽懂的粵曲。路過旗幟飄揚的廣場從未曾察覺的棕櫚。走之前，為了再看一次舊時山景，我跋涉去見山。遠山望不見，只好畫下山的輪廓。11 今日和昨日海水分明同樣湛藍，哪知道其中有一片消失的海。12 承載海水投影的玻璃好像染上了水的藍色，而我離開前不得不打碎它。13 總有一些東西，影像無法捕捉，測繪無法量度，檔案無法復修。如果說失去者便是「虛空」，我的工作不是重建、不是召回，而是通過描畫它周圍的體積，讓這「虛空」逐漸顯影。我搬去的地方不再有海，但每個曾順水遠行的人腦中都有一汪。我無力挽留消失的水域，卻可以觸發海的記憶、海的感受。在平靜無波的水中，嘗試抓取「漂浮在水上、沉默到水底、隨著水所流逝、以及化為雨水重新滲透進入土地的種種。」14 如此莊重地緬懷「消失」（disappearance）聽上去充滿鄉愁（nostalgic）而又徒勞無功。但只要願意精下心仔細聽，我用影像現場零零舍舍召喚出的，或許正是多個時空「消失」之時湧現出來的情感線索與身份感覺。15 它正從虛空出萌生，碎片、流動而無邊界；暫時未可指認、命名，只可覺察而莫可名狀。它與過往的命運相連，又留在你的身體裏，醞釀、生長。
所幸如此，消失者難消解，離開終究離不開。16 想起某天聽到亞巴斯（Akbar Abbas）的舊時採訪，那時似乎還無事發生，只有一些將至未至的不安在空氣中飄蕩。其中一句聽後如醍醐灌頂，在我記憶中語序打亂、重新排列：失望（disappointment）是未在預想位置（appointed place）的希望。如果用這樣的方式來解，希望並非早已消失，只是不在你我目力所及之處。我眼中的無能為力，或許只消邊走邊轉頭看看。這樣說來，離散的旅程提供錯置（displace）的經驗，藝術由此延伸出錯位（misplace）的方法。剪裁語言、拼貼情境、改寫故事。今天我將寫下的文字打亂，重新再編一次。詞語好像又重新有了意義。
編者注：
1. (resident in residence is vaguely opening and shutting its mouth）摘自羅玉梅《殘話小說》/ Disabled Novel，（DVD PAL, 19 mins，2010） 影像腳本。
2.《思鄉曲》，馬思聰（羅玉梅提供）。
3. 萬豐，集美阿爾勒發現獎馬琼珠個展展覽前言，2024。
4. 在新冠疫情初期，馬琼珠原計劃與家人從紐約飛去華沙，卻因護照上寫明的中國國籍被攔下。
5. 馬琼珠在集體討論中的回應。
6. 羅玉梅在集體討論中的回憶。
7. (Each building of King Lam Estate was named after plants: pine, palm, cotton, peach, elm, Chinese cedar, and banyan.）摘自羅玉梅《垃圾灣、植物：始於 1990》/ On Junk Bay, the Plants, from 1990（2015）影像腳本。
8. 羅玉梅展開《維多利亞之東》（2017）的研究時，曾對應1907年的文獻照片尋找將軍澳附近山脈而無果。
9. 常有人說羅玉梅近年來的創作是由影像轉為表演。羅玉梅對此不置可否——對她來說，影像現場是影像的延伸。
10. 在《維多利亞之東》（2017）中，回應填海造陸，羅玉梅通過影像與聲音來重塑海之經驗。
11. 羅玉梅展開《維多利亞之東》（2017）的研究時，曾對應1907年的文獻照片尋找將軍澳附近山脈而無果。
12. 在《維多利亞之東》（2017）中，回應填海造陸，羅玉梅通過影像與聲音來重塑海之經驗。
13. 羅玉梅在即將離港時，將在《維多利亞之東》用作投影的強化玻璃打碎。是為《再見維多利亞之東》行為表演（2021）。
14. 羅玉梅《那傳來浪潮的方向》（2018-2021）項目介紹。
15. 參考：Ackbar Abbas, Hong Kong: Culture and the Politics of Disappearance, 1997
16. 2017年亞巴斯（Ackbar Abbas）回港時與陳清僑為明報所做對談《甚麼人訪問甚麼人﹕〈香港：文化及消失的政治〉作者亞巴斯》（2017）。
作者：沈軍，通過策劃，研究，寫作與製檔與朋友們共同合作。她曾任職於長征計劃、廣東時代美術館等機構，現於2025年推出的倫敦非盈利藝術空間YDP擔任策展人。
Murmurs of The Diaspora
We practice each other's native languages and reside in a foreign country together while occasionally traveling back and forth. Our languages inevitably got disoriented by such to-and-fro. Certain terms can only be accurately expressed in Cantonese, and at times I cannot find substitutions for them. As I momentarily lose focus, Chinese slips out, and I hastily cover it up with accented English. More often, even though I have so much to say, the voice gets stuck in the throat; no matter how my lips twist, no sound comes out. I might even blurt out some words out of frustration, but when my ears hear what my mouth has said, I regret that my inability to express has betrayed the spirit of our conversation. I must have made a fool of myself. She tries her best to comprehend my words, which is unusual in social conversations. To show my gratitude, I quickly round up the dialogue. “Resident in residence is vaguely opening and shutting its mouth.'1 I probably cannot grasp the essence of language anymore. Or am I just deluding myself into thinking I can be understood perfectly?
One day I talked in my sleep; after I woke he told me that it was in Cantonese.
“My dear sentimental child from the warm and beautiful Southern land, why don’t you go home?”2
“This is the result of long-standing imagination and cultivation, which is also a choice that comes naturally when the timing is right.”3
As I was stopped at immigration for the first time due to the nationality inscribed on my passport, I realized that those few inconspicuous words were the boundary.4 I thought I was already used to defining who I am from the perspective of others: daughter, sister, wife, mother, as well as citizen of a certain country and foreign resident in a foreign land. “Artist" appears to be a solitary affiliation amid these relational titles. This identity that affirms itself without relying on others teeters as fate takes unexpected turns. At the same time I do not think I can be called a "traveller”, nor do I often have the headspace and mind to take in the scenery.5 I clear my mind to make room for a list of necessities, address of the day and meals to be cooked. Trying to survive in a foreign land feels like a struggle that overlaps with the situation of barely making a living as an artist. In this constant process of migration, time, space, and materials are all limited to the extent that any creations seem to be a kind of luxury. However, has balancing survival and creation always been a luxury?
When survival becomes life’s top priority, obstacles that once seemed insurmountable no longer matter. I have heard that early Chinese immigrants often lied about being eighteen years old and adopted an English name, in order to obtain work permits. Immigration redefined the quantity of living days, in which names and birthdays are no longer adequate information to identify a person. After years of working with archival documents, I came to the clear realization that only through the gaps in these records can one access the concrete and reified stories of life. I remember in an earlier interview when a friend's mother reminisced about her voyage and described it as "bitter". Was she referring to the salty, fishy scent of the sea breeze, the bile from seasickness, or the heartache of leaving home?6 Later as I found myself adrift as well, it was impossible to fit my documents and photographs into the luggage, only my memories could be carried with me. In the absence of physical evidence, I eventually lost track of the exact dates. Sometimes memories seem so hazy that I wonder if they are real or mere illusions. If a "record" is no longer supported by time, coordinates, or substance, it probably does not count as "history" in the most generic sense, yet it bears the weight of my life. In this regard, is my life heavy or light enough to be insignificant?
To Ludwig Wittgenstein, lightness is comparable to a bird rather than a feather. If lightness carries volume, elasticity, and kinetic energy, does that make it a sufficient description for life? Images leap from clichés, concepts released from mundane affairs, and life experiences captured in a fleeting moment. During the days that seem additional as I got held up in a foreign land, birds catch my eye. There is an old saying that you are destined to leave home once your wings are sturdy enough; seeing them appear over different cities has become a familiar solace. In this journey where any endings seem unfathomable, ever-changing becomes the only constant, and the meanings of things overturn. Just as I seem to forget the identity of "artist", "creation" rings a bell in my mind. I shoot photos in daylight while walking and make edits during the night under artificial light. It seems that things referred to as works are obliged to take the shape of a certain figure, volume, or value. So let me call it an exercise for now - practice doing something, which becomes a kind of anchor. Amid these unpredictable daily routines, creation is no longer just an embellishment but has reverted to a basic necessity. It wrings out a force that make my days count.
For me, I acquire some plants with every move, because nurturing another life tends to ground my own. Occasionally, I name the plants as if I am naming people, as if to reminisce the naming of buildings in my childhood neighbourhood, but in a reversed manner. "Each building was named after plants: pine, palm, cotton, peach, elm, Chinese cedar and banyan."7 Plants from the South got sown and grown in Northern countries, creating a sense of home in artificial landscapes. But what about the migrants? Years of wandering only allows for seeking new beginnings, yet it seems always impossible to project potential endings. I can only plan the nearest small step: at least the plants moved to exhibition halls will be re-rooted to the land after the show.8 If we consider research, creation, and exhibition as living entities, artists may well be affectionate in nature. Art dissolves the boundaries between work and life, and I wouldn’t have it otherwise. To attend to the present, to revisit histories, to care for people and their stories… since when should such things ever cease? People insist on drawing boundaries for things, naming them so as to remember them. Identity. Gender. Medium. Theme. But how can framed notions reflect ceaseless flow of life? People often assume "images" as final destinations, unaware that the lives of migrants only depend on perpetual departure. I delve into the depths of images, seemingly adopting a site-specific approach that invokes historical spirits and triggers emotional resonance. But isn’t the human body’s presence in the world already the most visceral site-specificity of all?9
While on the road, a site is always on the move, alongside time, order and perception. With the body as the only anchor point, I utilize it to re-measure time, histories and geographies. I was rebellious in youth– I took pleasure in shattering things from whole to pieces, provoking ideas of histories and gender, blurring human silhouettes, extracting still life from landscapes, and juxtaposing them with their archetypes. Nowadays things flash past right before me, and it slips away before I even manage to capture a complete image. Birds rise from the horizon, buildings fall from the sky. A kite from the sea got released, and the moon tonight hangs like a dropping line. More remained as intended blankness out there: the end of the sky is unknown, trees are cut through by buildings, and by the time I lift my camera, the birds have already flown far away, while affiliated shadows of the beings are too blurred to be identified. Days pass quickly, and I move hastily; my hands kept cutting and pasting my thoughts, while each day I keep forgetting more bits and pieces. Logic fails in face of my images, yet your body is surrounded by my experiences. It renders some sort of dislocation: while you assume to be witnessing an entirely new creation, there remains an underlying familiarity. Admittedly I am porous, that is how I manage to connect with you. Only in hindsight do I see: the work is almost an autobiography - silently choreographing a displaced body, whispering a tongue of diaspora.10 You cannot help but wonder: is collage all about deconstructing an entity into fragments, or is it meant to assemble fragments into an entity?
For someone who recollects historical fragments and recounts stories, when have we ever experienced totality and completeness? With the experience of displacement I came to the realization that "loss" is not perceived as individual events, but as every lingering second and moment. When the body begins to understand the feeling of loss, the mind starts paying attention to things once taken for granted: local literature I did not appreciate in my youth, Cantonese songs I refused to understand, and the palm trees in the square with fluttering flags that I never noticed. I trekked for the nostalgic mountain view one last time before I go. I can only sketch the outline as the distant mountains are not visible.11 The sea today shares distinctly the same shade of blue as yesterday’s, yet within it lies a patch of vanished ocean.12 The glass that holds the projection of the seawater seems to have absorbed the blue; and before I depart, I must shatter it.13 There is always something that goes beyond what images can capture, measurements can quantify, and records can restore. If the loss is eventually a "void", my work is not to reconstruct or recall, but to delineate the surrounding volume, hence allowing this “void” to reveal gradually. The place I moved to no longer connects to a reachable sea, but every person who has sailed away carries a pool of it in their minds. I cannot retain the disappearing waters, but the memories and sensations of the sea remains evocable. Amid the calm waters, I attempt to grasp what has been "floating on the surface, sinking to the depths, flowing with the water, and transforming into rain that seeps back into the land."14 To solemnly reminisce about "disappearance" sounds nostalgic yet futile. But if one is willing to listen closely and carefully, what I summon through fragmented images may well be the emotional threads and senses of identity that emerge from multiple dimensions of "disappearance".15 It is sprouting from the void - fragmented, fluid, and boundless; it may be temporarily unidentifiable and unnamed, and can only be felt and sensed. It connects with past destinies and remains within your body, nourishing and growing.
Fortunately, those who have gone are not entirely dispelled; adrift but ultimately inescapable. I recall tuning in an old interview with Ackbar Abbas, when it seemed that nothing significant had yet occurred, only with a sense of impending unease lingering in the air. One sentence struck me profoundly, as I reordered the wordings from my memory: Disappointment is a form of hope that didn’t arrive at an appointed place. If we understand it this way, hope has not vanished at the first place; it remains at an outlying distance that is currently out of sight. Feelings of helplessness may well be eased if I look back occasionally as I wander. In this regard, the diasporic journey offers an experience of displacement, from which art is allowed to extend its appropriation of the misplaced - crafting language, collaging contexts, rewriting stories. Today as I jumble the words written and reassemble them, they seem to regain a certain form of meaning.
Footnotes:
1. Extracted from the video script of Law Yuk Mui’s Disabled Novel (DVD PAL, 19 mins, 2010)
2. ‘Song of Nostalgia’, Ma Sicong (provided by Law Yuk Mui).
3. Preface by Chris Wan for Ivy Ma’s solo exhibition at the Jimei x Arles Discovery Award, 2024.
4. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ivy Ma originally planned to fly from New York to Warsaw with her family, but was stopped due to her Chinese nationality indicated on her passport.
5. Ivy Ma’s response in a group discussion.
6. Law Yuk Mui’s recollection at a group discussion.
7. Extracted from the video script of Law Yuk Mui’s On Junk Bay, The Plant, 1990 - present (2015).
8. Law Yuk Mui set the plants back to the soil after her exhibition for On Junk Bay, The Plant, 1990 - present (2015).
9. People often comment that Law Yuk Mui’s recent practice has shifted from image to performance. She remains noncommittal about this – to her, on-site image experience is an extension of the image itself.
10. Ivy Ma came to the awareness of the autobiographical dimension of her works during her durational conversation with curator Chris Wan.
11. When Law Yuk Mui was carrying out her research for Victoria East (2017), she searched in vain for the mountainous area near Tseung Kwan O as illustrated on the archival photograph from 1907.
12. Law Yuk Mui responded to land reclamation in Victoria East (2017) with an reinterpreted experience of the sea through image and sound.
13. As Law Yuk Mui was about to leave Hong Kong, she shattered the tempered glass used for the projection in Victoria East (2017) as part of the performance for Goodbye, See You Again, Victoria East (2021-2022).
14. Project introduction from Law Yuk Mui’s From Whence the Waves Came (2018-2021).
15. Reference from Ackbar Abbas, Hong Kong: Culture and the Politics of Disappearance, 1997
16. In 2017, Ackbar Abbas returned to Hong Kong and had a conversation with Chan Ching-kiu for Ming Tao’s “Who Interviews Whom: Ackbar Abbas, author of Hong Kong: Culture and the Politics of Disappearance” (2017).
Written by Shen Jun. Her collaborative practice spans research, curating, writing and archiving, focusing on affective modulation. She has held curatorial roles at the Long March Project, Guangdong Times Museum, and currently works as the curator of London-based non-profit art space YDP set to launch in 2025.
Translated by Christine Lee
