“What digital art creates is a kind of ‘invisible’ and ‘endless’ beauty and what we need is an eye to discover beauty. My job is to find and mine that logic and beauty and then present it. I hope to follow my heart, do my best to create, and do every piece of art well in the future.”
“数字艺术创造的是一种‘无形’和‘无尽’的美，我们需要的是发现美的眼睛。我的工作是找到并挖掘这种逻辑和美，然后呈现它。我希望能跟随我的心，尽我所能去创造，把每一件艺术品都做好。”
— Zhang Zhoujie 張周捷
About the artist
关于藝術家
Zhang Zhoujie, born in the 1980s, now lives in Shanghai. He is an independent designer, digital artist, and pioneer practitioner in digital creation. Zhoujie graduated from Central Saint Martin’s College of Art and Design in the United Kingdom and is a visiting researcher at the British Institute of Architects.
张周杰，1980年代出生，现居上海。他是一位独立设计师、数字艺术家和数字创作的先驱实践者。周杰毕业于英国中央圣马丁艺术与设计学院，现为英国建筑师学会客座研究员。
Zhang Zhoujie Digital Lab was founded in 2010, and the digital furniture brand “EndlessForm” ® was founded in 2018. His work has been exhibited worldwide and is held in numerous museums, galleries, and private collections. He is trying to use “digital furniture” as a breakthrough to promote the reform of the traditional furniture industry. He and his team have spent more than eight years training computers to design, and this research is now entering an accelerated period.
張周捷数码实验室成立于2010年，数码家具品牌“EndlessForm”®成立于2018年。他的作品已在全球范围内展出，并被众多博物馆、画廊和私人收藏。他正试图以“数字家具”为突破口，推动传统家具行业的变革。他和他的团队花费了八年多的时间来训练计算机进行设计，现在这项研究正在进入加速期。
Connecting with nature
与大自然的连结
In Zhang Zhoujie’s creations, we can see his connection with nature and an attitude of advocating nature. The most influential books on his design are philosophy books, especially some Taoist thoughts on natural creation.
在張周捷的创作中，我们可以看到他与自然的联系和崇尚自然的态度。对他的设计影响最大的书籍是哲学书籍，尤其是一些道家关于自然创造的思想。
#1 Wing-shaped mechanical interactive sculpture《翼》
Jiading is the hometown of cranes. In ancient times, the crane was one of the most admired creatures. Its physique is sleek and graceful, and its feathers are simple and pure.
嘉定是鹤之乡。在古代，鹤是最受推崇的生物之一。它的体型圆润优雅，羽毛质朴纯洁。
In the wetlands of the past, the sound of flying cranes was heard in the wild, and when cities were built on fertile soil, cranes were passed down in people’s stories and street names. Nowadays, urbanization is accelerating, and cranes are shadowed outside the city. Zhang Zhoujie wants to inspire a sense of nature, making the spectator reconsider the human-nature interaction and bring back memories of cranes.
昔日的湿地，在野外都能听到鹤飞的声音，当城市建在肥沃的土地上时，鹤在人们的故事和街名中流传下来。如今，城市化进程正在加速，起重机在城外笼罩着阴影。张周杰想要激发一种自然感，让观众重新思考人与自然的互动，唤起对仙鹤的回忆。
If a computer were a designer, what would it make?
如果计算机是设计师，它会做什么？
（artist manuscript）艺术家手稿
ZhouJie wanted to recreate the dynamic and natural state of flying cranes soaring through the sky, so he created a wing-shaped mechanism that uses unprecedented scales of wing frequency and amplitude as well as computer control to echo the active principle of changes in the natural environment. It is by far the world’s most significant digital flight dynamics installation to date.
張周捷想重现飞鹤翱翔于天空的动态和自然状态，因此他创造了一个翼形机械装置，利用前所未有的机翼频率和幅度尺度以及计算机控制来呼应自然环境变化的主动原理。是迄今为止世界上最重要的数字飞行动力学装置。
“I think the posture and state of the crane when it is flying is the best.”
“我认为仙鹤飞行时的姿势和状态是最好的。”
—Zhang Zhoujie 張周捷
Since the work’s wingspan is 13 meters long, the wingspan component is made of high-strength titanium alloy material to assure the work’s lightness. The torso is constructed of stainless steel, and its incredibly complex and delicate production process is the result of 10 years of research and development. The observer sees a flying crane from afar as the piece leaps from the top of the skyscraper and views the entire city.
由于作品的翼展长达13米，翼展部件采用高强度钛合金材料制成，保证了作品的轻盈。躯干由不锈钢制成，其极其复杂和精致的生产过程是 10 年研发的成果。当这件作品从摩天大楼的顶部跃出并俯瞰整个城市时，观察者从远处看到了一只飞翔的仙鹤。
Zhang Zhoujie used cranes to express Daoism’s desire for freedom, which is not constrained by the city’s heights, allowing the residents of the congested metropolis to relax and unwind from their daily stresses.
张周捷将道教追求自由的创作理念，以仙鹤为代表，独立于这座城市的高处。让拥挤的大都市中的人们在生活压力中也能得到一点宁静。
#2 Tweening Birds《飞起》
Western science and eastern poetry appear to follow separate routes, but they both go to the same destination. This sculpture by Zhang Zhoujie’s digital laboratory combines an advanced artistic language with a unique digital algorithm to preserve the moment when the bird spreads its wings, carried by the algorithm’s rhythm of natural truth and poetry.
西方科学和东方诗詞似乎走的是不同的路线，但它们都走向了同一个目的地。这件来自张周杰数字实验室的雕塑作品，结合了先进的艺术语言和独特的数字算法，以自然真理和诗意的算法韵律承载着小鸟展翅的瞬间。
The flying bird’s prototype is abstract in nature. Triangular faces are used to form the beak, wings, and body. Zhoujie has purposefully made the bird’s shape abstract. Birds are both an aesthetic icon and the embodiment of nature and the human dream.
飞鸟的原型本质上是抽象的。三角形面用于形成喙、翅膀和身体。張周捷有目的地抽象了鸟的形状。鸟类既是审美的象征，也是自然和人类梦想的体现。
The bird is ready to fly from the water’s surface to the sky, and it is made up of more than 25 bits. It is highly abstract and strange when considered as a whole. This permits the work to provide visitors with a rich sense of perception, catching every motionless piece or unleashing explosive force, inspiring people’s various perspectives in the same packed public place.
这只鸟准备从水面飞向天空，它由超过25个比特组成。从整体上看，它是高度抽象和奇怪的。这使得作品能够为参观者提供丰富的感知，捕捉每一个静止的片段或释放爆发力，在同一个拥挤的公共场所激发人们的各种视角。
This sculpture reinforces the dynamic moment, by reiterating the implicit and concealed picture of traditional Chinese painting. The sculpture’s creative shape changes depending on the viewer’s perspective, and the layers and three-dimensional structure of the piece alter as well. The explosive power of the sculptural works is presented, and people’s different perspectives are triggered in the public area by capturing static parts of the depicted art forms. This sculpture stands at the mall’s entryway, and its high-spirited posture matches the attitude of greeting consumers.
这件雕塑通过重申中国画的含蓄和隐蔽画面，强化了动态瞬间。雕塑的创意形状会随着观者的视角而变化，作品的层次和三维结构也会发生变化。呈现雕塑作品的爆发力，通过捕捉所描绘的艺术形式的静态部分，在公共区域引发人们不同的视角。这座雕塑豎立在商场的入口处，昂扬的姿态与迎接消费者的态度相得益彰。
#3 Digital Wave《数位波浪》
Zhang Zhoujie’s Digital Lab’s sculpture piece ‘Digital Wave’ is based on the element of “water” and was inspired by the physical position of Hangzhou’s southern bank of the Qiantang River and the development of the Wu-Yue culture through the flow of water.
张周杰数位实验室的雕塑作品《数位波浪》以“水”为元素，灵感来自杭州钱塘江南岸的物理位置以及吴越文化在水流中的发展。
It uses a computerized design to create a four-layered stainless-steel framework with 2,550 twisted strips. The semi-hollow structure under the water surface generates a light and shadow effect of repetitive folding and multi-faceted reflection with the sunlight, evoking a sensation of speed and tension in the “water.”
它使用计算机化设计创建了一个带有 2,550 条扭曲带的四层不锈钢框架。水面下的半镂空结构在阳光的照射下产生重复折叠和多面反射的光影效果，在“水中”唤起一种速度感和张力感。
This is a relationship between a static water “splash” and a dynamic dripping “ripple”. It seems like a symphony of movement and stillness, swaying with light and shadow from afar. The “light and shadow curtain” generated by the 1.3-meter-high sculptures naturally produces a sensation of immersion, and pedestrian pathways connect at the end of the artwork.
这是一个静态的水“溅”和一个动态的滴水“涟漪”之间的关系。仿佛一曲动静交响，远方有光影摇曳。1.3米高的雕塑所产生的“光影幕”自然而然地产生了一种沉浸感，人行道连接在艺术品的尽头。
“My designs are very focused on computer, digital possibilities. What role can it play in the future? If a computer were a designer, what would it make? So, my work involves a lot, with programs, hardware, and digital tools, and then making it in a good way; it’s a bit like exploration. These works are some staged results.”
“我的设计非常关注计算机和数字的可能性。未来还能发挥什么作用？如果计算机是设计师，它会做什么？所以，我的工作涉及很多，包括程序、硬件和数字工具，然后以一种好的方式进行制作；这有点像探索。这些作品是一些阶段性的成果。”
—Zhang Zhoujie 張周捷
The development trend of digital art
数字艺术的发展趋势
The medium of digital art is unmistakably digital; it might be a model, 3D, or picture; it could also be a pixel grid, 3D, data, or pixel. Digital tools such as apps, algorithms, and models are all generated in this area.
数字艺术的媒介无疑是数字化的。它可能是模型、3D 或图片；它也可以是像素网格、3D、数据或像素。应用程序、算法和模型等数字工具都在这个领域产生。
According to Zhang Zhoujie, technology and art have always been essential mixes. like, Da Vinci’s paintings and some contemporary new media art, are both combined with art with technology. Digital art improves our world perspective, outlook on life, values, and human cognition of the world because technology is continuously evolving. Art and technology are inextricably linked. This is a recurring topic.
在张周杰看来，技术和艺术一直是必不可少的组合。比如，达芬奇的画作和一些当代新媒体艺术，都是艺术与科技的结合。数字艺术改善了我们的世界观、人生观、价值观和人类对世界的认知，因为技术在不断发展。艺术与科技密不可分。这是一个反复出现的话题。
The future development trend is unpredictably unexpected, and everyone is paying closer attention and becoming more willing to embrace this type of digital employment. And this is a totally new experience, it is no longer a painting, a movie, or an image. it may be more immersive, the interaction between people and works, or the method in which they engage are all new experiences. This is a unique feature of digital art, as well as an unavoidable tendency in the evolution of art.
未来的发展趋势出人意料，大家更加关注，也更愿意從事这种数字化行业。这是一种全新的体验，它不再是一幅画、一部电影或一幅图像。它可能更加身临其境，人与作品之间的互动，或者他们参与的方式都是新的体验。这是数字艺术的独特之处，也是艺术演进过程中不可回避的趋势。
*all images and artworks belong to the artist & his representing galleries respectively
*所有图像和艺术品分别属于艺术家及其他们代表的画廊
Translation 翻译 Alice Yip
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