From Truck Driver to the Political Commissar of the Mounted Troops
2012, Sound&Black and White Single-channel video, 8”51’
…Along both stretches of the village road, one sees flowers blooming naturally, without an object of reference or the pursuit of meaning. Simply walking and encountering completed the entire meaning. Here, language and time are safe in their own domains, and yet they represent and intermesh with one another. Li Ran’s poetic lines refract the temporality which was of concern to the artist at the time of creation, along with the related question of modernity. In this work, a mimicry of a Soviet film, “The Fate of a Man,” Li Ran plays the role of a Soviet soldier: he imitates to a tee the affected and artificial style of acting under Communist ideology, and enacts the story of a Soviet soldier reminiscing on the past and yearning for the future….
Text from Mimicry and Return-by Su Wei.
从卡车司机到骑兵政委
2012/单通道黑白有声视频/8分51秒
……走在乡村小路上，两旁的花朵按其本来的面貌开放，没有对象的指称，没有意义的追寻，行走、相遇，就完成了全部含义。在这里，语言和时间既安守在各自的地域，又相互象征和牵引着。这段诗意十足的文字折射出艺术家创作中所关心的时间性、及其连接的现代性问题。在这部取材于前苏联的电影《一个人的遭遇》的作品中，李然扮演了一位前苏联的士兵形象，惟妙惟肖地模仿了共产主义意识形态下矫情做作的演员表演方式，诉说了一位前苏士兵缅怀过去、憧憬未来的故事……
摘自苏伟撰写的《模仿与还原》。