迷失面容的守護者 A keeper of lost visages
The face was neither absent nor present, lingering in a liminal space between being and forgetting. The shopkeeper told her the portrait had been discovered in an old asylum, locked away for decades, its subject unknown.
2025.02.10
珍是一位迷失面容的守護者，一位收集被時間模糊的回聲者。她徘徊於被遺忘的小巷與廢棄的閣樓之間，尋找那些被歷史拋棄的肖像——那些被塵埃與忽視覆蓋的模糊影像。但珍並不認為它們已經消失；她覺得它們只是在等待，被記憶。
某個夜晚，在一間燈光昏暗的古董店裡，珍發現了一幅與眾不同的肖像。畫面的色彩猶如低語——灰色與褐色交融，白色的微光點亮了鼻樑的輪廓，一片陰影模糊了曾經注視這世界的眼眸。店主告訴她，這幅畫是在一座舊精神病院裡發現的，塵封數十年，畫中人已無法考證。
珍將畫帶回家，開始她的工作。她輕輕地將手指按在畫布上，感受著記憶的脈搏。當她沿著模糊的臉龐輪廓描繪時，空氣中彷彿響起微弱的低語。笑聲的碎片、落葉的顫動、一個名字的回音——支離破碎的音節困在遺忘的紋理裡。
她開始作畫，不是為了修復，而是為了揭示。每一筆，她並非賦予新生，而是喚醒隱藏在朦朧中的存在。陰影加深，又逐漸柔和。一絲認識的光芒在塗抹的黑暗中閃爍。然後，彷彿畫像輕輕吐息，一個名字從畫布中浮現——
珍。
她自己的名字。這不是藝術家的簽名，而是一位被遺忘者的自我印記。過去與現在交織，層層疊疊，如同她親手描繪的筆觸。珍終於明白——她不是在發掘一個陌生人的記憶，而是在描繪自己的回歸。
Jane was a keeper of lost visages, a collector of echoes from faces blurred by time. She wandered through forgotten alleys and abandoned attics, seeking portraits discarded by history—images smudged, faded, or obscured by layers of dust and neglect. But Jane did not see them as lost; she saw them as waiting, yearning to be remembered.
One evening, in a dim-lit antique store, Jane found a portrait unlike any other. The surface was a whisper of colors—ashen grays melting into muted browns, a flicker of white where a nose should be, a smudge of shadow where an eye had once gazed. The face was neither absent nor present, lingering in a liminal space between being and forgetting. The shopkeeper told her the portrait had been discovered in an old asylum, locked away for decades, its subject unknown.
Jane took it home and began her work. She pressed her fingers lightly against the canvas, feeling for the pulse of memory. As she traced the contours of the obscured face, faint whispers stirred in the air. Fragments of laughter, the rustle of leaves, the echo of a name—half-formed syllables caught in the fabric of forgetting.
She set to painting, not to restore but to reveal. With each stroke, she did not impose a new face but coaxed forth what already existed beneath the haze. Shadows deepened, softened. A glint of recognition flickered in the smeared darkness. And then, as though the portrait exhaled, the name drifted from the canvas—
Jane.
Her own name. A signature not of an artist, but of the forgotten self. The past folded into the present, layering like the very strokes she had placed. Jane understood then—she had not been uncovering a stranger’s memory. She had been painting her own return.
