Installation view of Sarah Crowner’s ‘Painting for a Stage’ at Simon Lee Gallery, Hong Kong. Courtesy of the artist and Simon Lee Gallery

Painting and performance art share a curious – if not always immediately apparent – kinship. Pollock gave rise to the term ‘action painting’ (by way of critic Harold Rosenberg), Rauschenberg toured with and produced sets for choreographer Merce Cunningham’s dance company, while Klein used nude female models as his paintbrush. Cue artist Sarah Crowner, the New York-based painter who, too, has seamlessly sewn together both in a new series of stitched canvases for her first solo exhibition in Asia, on view at Simon Lee Gallery in Hong Kong.

绘画和表演艺术有着一种好奇的-如果不是总是立即显现-亲属关系。波洛克创造了“动作画”这个词(通过评论家哈罗德·罗森伯格)，劳森伯格与编舞家默斯·坎宁安的舞蹈团一起巡演并制作布景，而克莱因则用裸女模特作为他的画笔。线索艺术家莎拉克劳纳，纽约的画家，她也已经无缝地缝在一起，为她在亚洲的第一次个人展览的新系列缝合画布，在香港的西蒙李画廊观看。

Crowner’s vivid paintings tempt impulsive comparisons with Matisse and Ellsworth Kelly, but it’s the backs of her canvases that reveal she’s telling an altogether different story to them. The artist works directly on the floor of her Brooklyn studio, composing painted swatches of canvas and intuitively fastening them together with an industrial Juki sewing machine before stretching them onto a frame – ‘that’s the when the painting gets to the point where I can understand what it is.’ Crowner will stretch a painting ‘six or seven times’, altering its components until it’s deemed ‘successful’.

克劳纳的生动绘画吸引了与马蒂斯和埃尔斯沃思·凯利的冲动比较，但正是她的画布背后揭示了她在讲述一个完全不同的故事。这位艺术家直接在布鲁克林工作室的地板上创作画布，用一台工业的Juki缝纫机直观地把它们绑在一起，然后再把它们伸展到画框上-“那时，我就能理解它是什么了。”克劳纳将把一幅画“六到七次”拉伸，改变它的组成，直到它被认为是“成功的”。

Untitled, 2019, by Sarah Crowner, acrylic on canvas. Courtesy of the artist and Simon Lee Gallery

“无名”，2019年，莎拉·克劳纳著，“帆布上的丙烯酸”。由艺术家及李锡安画廊提供

‘Paintings for the Stage’ continues the artist’s architectural and scenographic interventions, recently explored in the American Ballet Theatre Company’s Garden Blue production. ‘The experience of working on that scale, and working with performers, dancers, musicians and choreographer was life-changing for me. It made me start thinking about my painting practice in a new way,’ explains Crowner, who designed costumes as well as a vast backdrop for Jessica Lang’s ballet.

‘为舞台的绘画’继续艺术家的建筑和场景干预，最近在美国芭蕾舞团剧团的花园蓝色生产探索。对我来说，这种规模的工作和与表演者、舞者、音乐家和舞蹈编导一起工作的经历改变了我的生活。“这让我开始以一种新的方式思考我的绘画练习，”克劳纳解释道，他为杰西卡·朗的芭蕾设计了服装和广阔的背景。

‘I thought what if I could take that [theatre] experience and somehow translate or at least bring one of those elements into the gallery and see what it does,’ says the artist. ‘For example, what would it be like to hang a painting on backdrop and how it would affect your reading of a painting?’ To wit, Crowner enlisted local scenic painter and theatre set designer Pink Lam to realise a wall painting for her Hong Kong exhibition, casting her largest canvas adrift in an aqueous azure mural.

这位艺术家说：“我想，如果我能利用这种(戏剧)体验，以某种方式将其中一种元素翻译到画廊，或者至少把其中一种元素带入画廊，看看它能做什么，该怎么办？例如，把一幅画挂在背景上会是什么感觉，它会如何影响你对一幅画的阅读？也就是说，克劳纳聘请当地风景画家和戏剧设计人员品克林为她的香港展览画了一幅墙画，把她最大的画布扔在一幅水色的蔚蓝壁画中。

Her latest body of work feels bolder, energised by her recent foray in the theatre. ‘I started placing different colours together that I normally wouldn’t… There’s a vibration and dimensionality that happens when you place these certain colours together and I was interested in playing up those experiences to the eye,’ she adds. ‘I’m interested in pushing that optical experience more and more.’ Encore! §

她的最新作品感觉更大胆，最近在剧院的尝试让她精力充沛。我开始把不同的颜色放在一起，我通常不会…当你把这些特定的颜色放在一起时，就会产生振动和维度效应，而我很有兴趣把这些体验渲染到眼前。“她补充道。“我对推动这种光学体验越来越感兴趣。”安可！§

树叶和阴影，丁香背景，2019年，萨拉克劳纳，与粉红林的墙上画。由艺术家和西蒙李画廊树叶和阴影，丁香背景，2019年，萨拉克劳纳，与墙上的粉红林画。由艺术家及李锡安画廊提供

几乎亲吻翅膀，2019年，莎拉克劳纳，丙烯酸帆布。由艺术家和西蒙李画廊几乎亲吻翅膀，2019年，萨拉克劳纳，亚克力帆布。由艺术家及李锡安画廊提供

香港赛门·李画廊莎拉·克劳纳的“舞台绘画”装置图。由艺术家及西蒙·李画廊在香港西蒙·李画廊展出莎拉·克劳纳的“舞台画”。由艺术家及李锡安画廊提供

旋转翅膀，2019年，萨拉克劳纳，丙烯酸帆布。由艺术家和西蒙李画廊旋转翅膀，2019年，萨拉克劳纳，亚克力帆布。由艺术家及李锡安画廊提供