Duchamp’s Rotative Object
(PHOTOGRAPH: 8x10 inches, 1995)
When it comes to circular objects, my earliest memory—aside from holding one during a photograph taken around the age of two—is of reading two lines from T.S. Eliot’s Little Gidding in my youth:
"What we call the beginning is often the end / And to make an end is to make a beginning"
(Four Quartets, p. 42, Faber and Faber, 1946).
These lines inspired me to write a poem about beginnings and endings. Duchamp’s Roto Reliefs similarly sparked my creativity, leading me to incorporate them into several photographs. Besides the image featuring recycled paper mentioned earlier, another photograph from my Forty Poems series bears traces of Duchamp’s rotative object: Face Structure With Spirals, 1995.
As for the recycled paper photo, there’s an additional anecdote. Around 1976, I used two of those photos to design a double-sided name card as a gift for Leung Ping-kwan (Ye Si). One side featured a chopping board, while the other depicted Duchamp’s rotative object. The chopping board image was a tribute to our collaboration on Foodscape (食事地域誌). I had used the chopping board as a starting point to create a visual pairing for his poem Onion, titling the photo Portrait of a Chopping Board.
Ping-kwan was delighted by the name cards, but unfortunately, I have no copies left today. If anyone happens to have preserved one, I hope they can lend it for scanning, so a record of it may be kept.
杜象旋轉物
關於圓形物，較早的記憶除了大約兩歲拍照時手握圓形物之外，年輕時候讀到T.S. Eliot 在Little Gidding 𥚃的兩行: “What we call the beginning is offen the end / And to make an end is to make a beginning” (Four Quartets, pages 42, Faber and Faber, 1946) 觸發我寫了一首關於開端與結尾的詩。杜象的Roto Reliefs 同樣也令我用作拍過好幾張照片。除了之前談過關於環迴再造紙的照片之外，在「Forty Poems」系列中，我的另一張照片也是有著杜象旋轉物的足印: 「Face Structure With Spirals, 1995」。關於再造紙的那張照片，還可以附加一個尾巴記，大約1976年間，我將其中的兩張照片，設計了一個兩面看的名片送給也斯。一面是砧板，另一面杜象旋轉物。其中砧板一圖是記念我與他合作的「食事地域誌」(FOODSCAPE)。我以砧板為起點，發展成為一圖配合他「洋蔥」一詩，照片的題目是「砧板的肖像」（Portrait of a Chopping Board)。也斯看著那些名片當然喜出望外，可惜我如今手上完全沒有存本。寄望誰個手上若有珍藏本，可借用掃描留個記事。