「回到昨天也沒用，因為我曾是另外一個人」，經歷一番奇遇後的愛麗絲說[1]。

如果歷史離不開敘事書寫，意味著現實成為歷史的過程中，參雜了想像與虛構。當海頓‧懷特提出歷史建構的過程有如文學創作，將歷史書寫與虛構之間建立一種對照，文史的界線將被抹除。過去發生的事件在他眼中有如量子處於疊加狀態，唯有敘事者《觀察者》的參與才能產生意義，成為歷史。雪克在近年創作中挪用各種檔案文件作為敘事材料，試圖以電影書寫與敘事實驗的手段再現台灣的歷史經驗。從定義歷史事實的國際條約到大眾流行音樂，對她來說這些不同類型的檔案文件都同時擁有真實與虛構的性質，誘發敘事想像的興趣。

《回魂記》與《台北公園》這兩件肖像畫形式的系列影片，分別從臺灣電影與文學中提取角色，勾勒不同時代臺灣人的影像再現。透過這些來自電影或文學的虛構角色，我們可以觀察到臺灣社會與文化曾有的樣貌與精神；《隱沒帶》以臺灣獨特地理環境與地緣政治之間的類比關係為主題，與利用歷史檔案影像、國際條約與臺灣文學作為材料的《不沉的航空母艦》，不論是將那些從二戰以來定義臺灣現況的條約文字轉變成迴盪在火山口的人造畫外音，或是把二戰美軍轟炸左營港的歷史影像動態化，都是試圖轉化文本的閱讀方式，經由另一種感知路徑來描繪臺灣地緣政治與文化歷史。

在重新組織、敘述這些過去事件與虛構文本的過程中，就像是觀察這座島嶼曾經的存在，參與我們未曾親身經歷過的歷史。那麼，應該要問的是這些過去的事件和我們的連結是什麼？它們是怎麼成為建構我們知識體系的基底？又如何影響現下時空的我們？

“But it’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then,” said Alice after her experience in the wonderland.

If historical writing and the creation of narrative are inseverable, it means the element of imagination and fiction is always involved in the process as present reality becomes history. When Hayden White proposed the concept that the process of historical construction is similar to literary creation, and constructed a comparison between historical writing and fiction, the boundary between literature and history has been eliminated all together. Past incidents and events, in his opinion, exist in a state of quantum superposition, and only the participation of narrators (observers) can render them meaningful and part of history. In recent years, Shake has appropriated various types of archives as her narrative materials in the attempt to represent Taiwanese historical experience through cinematic writing and narrative experiment. From history-making international treaty to popular music, these archives possess both realistic and fictional elements and excite her narrative imagination.

Two video works featured in the exhibition, Return and Taipei Park, are created in the form of portrait painting, respectively drawing inspiration from Taiwanese cinema and literature to delineate and represent Taiwanese people from different eras. Through these cinematic or literary characters, we can observe the appearance and spirit of Taiwanese society and culture in the past. Subduction Zone adopts the theme of the relationship between Taiwan’s unique geographic environment and geopolitics. An Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier makes use of historical images, words from an international treaty and Taiwanese literature as materials. Whether it is transforming the text of the treaty that have defined Taiwan’s status quo since the Second World War into artificial voiceover echoing above a volcanic crater or animating the historical images of the bombing of Zuoying Harbor by the US air force, the artist has shown us a way of reading through transforming texts, using an alternative perceptual route to depict Taiwan’s geopolitics and cultural history.

The process of re-organizing and narrating these historical events and fictional texts is similar to observing the past and existence of this island and participating in the history that we have never really had a chance to experience. Therefore, the question we should be asking is: what is the connection between these past events and our present? How do they factor into the construction of our knowledge system, and influence our reality now?

[1] 改寫自《愛麗絲夢遊仙境》，原文為：“...but it’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.”，當鷹頭獅問及愛麗絲的故事，愛麗絲像是突然意識到在事件經歷後的主體不連續與分裂，覺得當下的自己和過去的自己不是同一個人，Lewis Carroll，臺北，遠流，2010，p.216

1.The quote is taken from Alice in Wonderland. When the gryphon asked Alice about her story, the heroine suddenly realized the discontinued and broken subjectivity before and after her experience in the wonderland, and felt that she was already a different person from before. (Lewis Carroll. Taipei: Yuan-Liou Publishing Co., 2010, p. 216)