文章節選自2016.05 O KAMALATAMDAWAN ITA KONIA RIYAR 有這個海洋，我們才能成為人之處│DJ Hatfield
海洋對阿美族可能不是你所熟悉的景觀，海洋是冰箱，是良藥，是生命，是母親；她一代一代餵養著族人的身體，培育著族人的精神；海洋不是我們可以用貨幣買賣的「海景」，更不是待開發的資源，海洋扮演著一個重要的主題角色： 是人生倫理的核心，這片「五十步空間」
so, you see, to ‘amis the ocean is not the landscape with which you might be familiar. the ocean is a larder, a panacea. the ocean is life. the ocean is mother. she has generation after generation sustained the bodies of the people and nurtured their spirits. the ocean is not a beautiful view that you can buy with money, much less is the ocean a resource awaiting development. the ocean plays an important role, it is an active subject: it is the core of an ethical imagination, this “space of fifty steps”
對，我們可以說海跟人養護彼此，而且，有這樣跟 海洋的關係，我們才能malatamdaw成為人。所以，我們的人格一直再現，在「五十步空間」那裡。
ciRahic(拉黑子)的五十步空間，更強調海洋給予我們一個成為人的位置kamalatamdawan，他的作品也從觀察，勞動，撿拾的動作著手。如果陪Kaka ciRahic(拉黑子哥哥)去海邊mipodpod(撿拾)，你會看得很清楚，五十步空間，其實是日常生活在藝術領域的影子，就是說，日常生活中的一種靈魂，Rahic的動作跟族人去海邊撿貝類，撿海菜的動作很像，只是Rahic找到的，有一點不一樣，可能是環境危機的警告，又可能是快被遺忘的神話故事，可能是我們迷失方向，並需要返回的，如何malatamdaw的道路。在一步一步，在一布又一布，在一幅又一幅，ciRahic很意識地，取用生存技能，mipodpod a mipodpod。當他找到海洋的文字，我相信他所看到的，也是我們每次去海邊micekiw會看到的， 我們好像會看到老人給我們留下的文字，告訴我們「aka picarikos!」haan , 「limla’en to ko riyar niyam」 haan naira kita，只可惜我們早已忘記如何看，我們已經麻木了，已經看不懂無形有形之間，老人留下的文字。而那些文字，就在五十步空間。ciRahic的作品，為了我們將那些文字，再次出現，再次詮釋。
Rahic Talif’s work, “the space of fifty steps” underscores that the ocean gives us a place to become human, a kamalatamdawan. He begins these works with observation, labour, and the act of picking things up / gathering. If you were to accompany Rahic to mipodpod (gather), you would see clearly that his “space of fifty steps” is a reflection, in art, of an everyday act of subsistence, which is to say, following the ‘amis word for reflection ‘adingo, also a spirit found in everyday subsistence activity.
Rahic’s actions are so mundane, just like the actions that ‘Amis make when they go to the beach to gather shellfish (micekiw) or to gather sea vegetables. the difference is that Rahic picks up different things. They look like plastics, glass, and other discarded items that have floated to the shore. In his hands they might be warnings of ecological crisis, or nearly forgotten legends. They might even be a trace of the road we’ve forgotten, the path we’ve lost, the path to malatamdaw. Step by step, canvas after canvas, picture after picture, Rahic consciously employs subsistence skills, mipodpod a mipodpod.
when he discovers the ocean’s writing, I believe that what he finds is something that we see every time we go down to the beach to collect shellfish. We seem to see the writing the elders left behind as we gather, to hear the elders saying to us, aka picarikos haan, limlaen to ko riyar niyam haan naira kita. It’s just that we’ve long forgotten how to see. We have become numb, insensate, and have already lost the ability to read the writing that the elders, between form and formlessness, left behind for us.
this writing is in this “space of fifty steps.” Rahic’s art brings this writing back to us, reinterpreting it and showing it to us more clearly.
五十步空間是回到老人智慧的指標
“the space of fifty steps” is a sign to show us the way to find the elder’s wisdom.
拉黑子‧達立夫 Rahic Talif 