VOA常速英语:Art in a Suitcase Depicts War-Torn Syria

The building is completely exposed to the elements, but dangling staircases and clothes evoke the people who lived here: a truck buried by dust; blasted concrete between bombed out buildings…The three-dimensional art pieces at the Fairfield Museum in Fairfield Connecticut depict Street scrapes of Syria where seven years of war have killed hundreds of thousands and created millions of refugees.
这座建筑完全暴露在自然环境中，但摇晃的楼梯和衣服让人想起曾经在这里居住过的人：一辆蒙灰的卡车；炸毁的建筑物墙体……康涅狄格费尔菲尔德博物馆的这些3D艺术作品描绘了叙利亚街头的残局，七年的战争已经造成数十万人死亡，数百万人沦为难民。

Artist Muhammad Hafez calls his exhibit collateral damage.I think it’s easy to say that I’m obsessed with destruction,but it’s not obsession rather...I think...the human eye is fascinated by the detail of destruction.There is something that lures us into that complexity of something falling apart. And we’re always curious to find out what happened.
艺术家穆罕默德·哈菲兹称他的展览是"附带损害"。我想说自己很容易沉迷于毁灭，但这并不是沉迷……我认为……人类被破坏的细节所吸引。某种东西吸引我们，让我们思考土崩瓦解背后的复杂问题。我们总是很好奇到底发生了什么。

Mohammed Hafez was born in Damascus Syria and grew up in Saudi Arabia. He came to the US 15 years ago as an architecture student with a single entry only visa. That caused me to get stuck here eight years.This had caused a lot of homesickness and longing to the beautiful country that I have left. I started using scrap materials and leftover materials from architectural model-making, and I started remodeling old Damascus and old Aleppo in miniature form—the way they were before the war.
穆罕默德·哈菲兹出生于叙利亚大马士革，在沙特阿拉伯长大。15年前，他以建筑系学生的身份来到美国，当时只有一份入境签证。这让我在这里呆了八年。这让我非常想念家乡，渴望回到离开的美丽故土。我开始使用自制建筑模型的废弃剩余材料，我开始重塑古老的大马士革和阿勒颇的微缩模型。它们还是战前的样子。

Hafez’s new art project sheds light on the wars aftermath for refugees.He recreated the houses and the places refugees were forced to leave behind in vintage suitcases.When the word got out that I was doing this project,a lot of people came to me with their parents’ and grandparents’ suitcases, and I’m talking about Jewish communities, Irish communities, German communities, Indian communities that really felt and resonated with the pushback against today’s immigrants.And it reminded them of what their ancestors and their grandparents have been through in this country.
哈菲兹的新艺术项目揭示了战争给难民带来的后果。他重建了难民们被迫离开的房屋和地方，当时难民留下了一些老式行李箱。当我做这个项目的消息传出后，很多人带着他们父母和祖父母的行李箱来找我，我说的是犹太社区、爱尔兰社区、德国社区、印度社区，这些社区真正感受到了今天对移民的抵制。这让他们想起了其祖先和祖父母在这个国家所经历的一切。

To viewers Hafez is redefining the word refugee. I was really impressed listening to him talk about how art can be used to help humanize, something that the media just paints everybody with one brush. He’s taken all of these different little snippets of people’s lives,and that he’s showcasing them in a way that gives them their humanity back.The meticulously crafted miniatures are intriguing because of their detail. The artist really captures that even in chaos and as bad as things can be...you can find some beauty, and he captures that in the vases and the little flower pots and the hanging laundry and the lights and all the…you know...little chairs.
在观众看来，哈菲兹是在重新定义“难民”这个词。当我听他谈论艺术如何有助于人性化时，我真的印象深刻，媒体的描述只是一带而过。他从人们生活中截取了这些不同的片段，并以一种让回归人性的方式展示这些片段。这些精心制作的微缩模型因其细节而引人入胜。艺术家真正捕捉到了这一点，即使是在混乱和糟糕的情况下……你可以发现美，他在花瓶、小花盆、挂着的衣服、灯和所有……你知道的…小椅子。

Hafez feels responsible to use his artwork to connect people.I’m not building art to cater to my echo chambers, but I’d like to cater to somebody that might have what I call spicy opinions against refugees, Muslim, Americans, immigrants.Art is neutral, Hafez says, making it ideal to bridge divides.
哈菲兹觉得有义务用自己的作品把人们联系起来。我制作艺术品不是为了迎合我的“回音室”，而是为了应对那些可能对难民、穆斯林、美国人、移民持有着所谓尖锐观点的人。艺术是中性的，哈菲兹说，它是弥合分歧的理想途径。

For producer Junesoo in New Haven Connecticut, I’m Carol Pearson, VOA news.
Junesoo康涅狄格纽黑文制作，美国之音新闻记者Carol Pearson报道。