苍鑫近期的工作更像一个自然科学家在进行实验数据的收集，这是指他的进行六年多时间，带有“恋物癖”特征的标题为“舔”的系列作品。在艺术家用他的舌头来接触的各种物品中，有来自他身边的各种日用品，有他及他的朋友们收集的各种有意义或无意义的收藏品，也有在他所游历过的各种环境中选择的有标志性意义或无标志性意义的物品，甚至包括建筑物和地面。
这个工作的结果呈现在观众面前的是一幅幅制作精细的照片。
这种长期的、认真的、甚至是刻板的工作方式无疑会给观者带来一种心理压力，他们会自然而然地在这种“严肃”的工作背后发现一些巨大的意义。
这种心理期待来自于一个生理学上的事实，在各种生理感觉中，“味觉”体验可能会给体验者带来生理上某种程度的潜在伤害，而这种带有一定程度的“冒险”成分的感觉体验，如果我们没有明确的、非常实际的目的，有正常理智的人一般是不会贸然实施的。就像我们如果要辨别、体验一个陌生的环境或物品，我们可以通过视觉来观看它，可以通过触觉来抚摸它，或者是通过嗅觉来嗅闻它，但是，在各种不同文化的经验里，对味觉的体验都会很谨慎或者要具备巨大的勇气，就像有一句谚语，“第一个吃螃蟹的人是一个英雄”。那么，在苍鑫的这种带有“冒险”成分的、直接以味觉为主要的体验方式的系列作品中，我们必须要发现一个潜藏的“秘密”，发现它背后明确的“动机”！这种心理祈求来源于我们的一种普遍的社会经验。
从另外一方面来看，我们对苍鑫的这种“舔”的方式的困惑与它对我们的理解上的心理压力远来自于另一个源于中国文化传统中的关于“神农氏尝百草”的传说。神农氏是中国传说中的一位对用草药来治病很有研究的圣人，他为了研究各种植物的习性和药性，不惜冒着会对自己的身体造成伤害的危险，以一种实证主义的方式来对所有的植物进行尝试。在这里，神农的行为是有非常明确的目的的，他的行为的意义，以及他在中国的文化传统中能成为“圣人”的原因，皆是源自于他的目的的明确性与实用性。
这种困惑即来源于我们的普遍的社会经验和我们的既有的文化经验。首先，我们在分析的苍鑫的行为的过程中，我们将发现他的物品的选择在貌似认真的外表下实际是有很大程度的随意性和无目的性。而这种“随意性”与“无目的性”又是以某种程度的严格统一的方式呈现在我们的面前，迫使我们按照既有的社会、文化经验来对它进行“意义”的求证。但是，当我们按照既有的文化和社会经验产生困惑，以及对“形式”本身的困惑。这种“困惑”来源于我们的对自身“经验”的迷信。
这就是苍鑫的“舔”的无意义的意义。
The Meaning of the Meaningless
Wu Hong
More than anything, Cang Xin's recent work resembles the data gathered by a natural scientist through his experiments. I am referring to that series of works with 'fetishistic' tendencies entitled Communication that he has been engaged upon since 1996. The artist has used his tongue to make contact with a wide variety of things, including the everyday objects that surrounded him, meaningful or meaningless Items collected by himself or by friends, and objects of symbolic or unsymbollc significance selected from the different environments he has encountered during his travels - this last category includes buildings and the very ground itself.
The result of his labours as seen by the audience Is a series of exquisitely executed photographs. This evidence of an assiduous, almost mechanical working method sustained over a long period of time doubtless exerts a psychological pressure on the viewer, who will spontaneously see great significance in such a“serious”work as this.
This psychological expectation is born of a physiological fact: using our sense of taste to experience new physiological sensations will always involve a certain level of potential physiological harm, and a normal rational person would not usually rush into this kind of“high risk”sensory experience without a very definite and real objective. If we want to perceive or experience an unfamiliar environment or object, we can observe its appearance with our eyes, feel Its texture with our hands, or sniff Its scent with our noses. But across various different cultures, using the mouth and tongue to“taste”the unfamiliar is seen as something to be cautious about, something that requires great courage -just as in the Chinese proverb that claims“the first person to eat crab was a hero”. So, we must find the hidden“secret”behind Cang Xin's decision, in his work, to brave the element of 'risk' and experience the world directly and primarily through his sense of taste; we must find the clear and definite“motive”that lies behind it. It is a kind of psychological prayer the origins of which lie in a social experience common to us all.
Looking at it from another angle, our puzzlement at Cang Xin's 'licking' method and the psychological pressure it exerts on our understanding has still another source. This work bears a certain resemblance to the ancient Chinese legend of'Shen Nong Tasted the Hundred Herbs'. In Chinese cultural tradition Shen Nong is the“father”of Chinese herbal medicine, an ancient sage or emperor who did extensive research into the use of medicinal herbs to cure sickness. He tasted every species of plant with his own mouth in order to distinguish the beneficial from the poisonous and study their medicinal properties, a sort of positivist method that involved a very real danger to his own health. Shen Nong acted with a very clear and definite objective; the meaning of his actions and the reason why he Is considered a“sage”by Chinese cultural tradition both lie in the conviction and practicality of his alms.
However, Cang Xin‘s“licking”presents us with the conundrum of an apparently“meaningless”meaning. This puzzlement comes from our common social experience, and from our already pre-esisting cultural experience. Above all, In the process of analysing Cang Xin's performances we will discover that his choice of objects, while on the surface appearing to be conscientious and deliberate in actual fact has a very large degree of randomness and aimlessness. Furthermore this“randomness”and“aimlessness”is presented to us in a way that is to a certain extent strictly uniform, and we are forced to search for evidence of “meaning”in it according to pre-esisting social and cultural experience. But when our pre-esisting experience proves to be of no use to us in divining these“latent”objectives, we are then forced in the opposite direction. Our pre-esisting social and cultural experience becomes the conundrum that confuses us; we are even perplexed by“form”Itself. This confusion is the consequence of blind belief In our own personal“experience”.
This is the meaning behind Cang Xln’s“meaningless”licking.