D reamlike and expressive, Hernan Bas’s The Ash Tree (At Once a Voice Arose Among the Bleak Twigs Overhead) imagines an ambiguous temporal space, a twilight zone that is one part surreal and one part nostalgic. The artist’s brushstrokes build a sublime vista in which a solitary figure sits, surrounded by fantastical overgrowth in colours reminiscent of decomposing vegetation and chemical spills. At points Bas’s dense colour work threatens to engulf this figure, at once intoxicating, beautiful and threatening. As Bas describes, "I've always pictured my figures as being in a choose-your-own-adventure book, and the person looking at the painting can choose where the story is going" (Hernan Bas in conversation with Nancy Spector in: Hernan Bas, New York 2014, p. 60). Inviting the viewer into the heady and mysterious landscape of the canvas, one can extract fragments of the romantic and nostalgic fantasy and coming of age adventures characteristic of Bas’s distinctive oeuvre. The chromatic vibrancy embellishes and destabilises, with Bas’s composition in a state of dynamic flux that suggests something of the transience and uncertainty of adolescence. Bas’s characteristic androgynous male figures, depicted betwixt youth and adulthood, exist in a state of transformation, the present work representing the meeting point between desire, self-discovery and magical thinking.

Since his inclusion in the 2004 Whitney Biennial, Bas has received widespread acclaim for his paintings in which history and fantasy mix. Bas’s magical landscapes are pulled from his vast range of references, from 19^th century poetry to paranormal television, an inquisitiveness which Bas has described as defining much of his artistic practice: “A lot of my work [is about] having a curiosity about everything, and a lot of that curiosity lends itself to mysteries of unknown and the paranormal world” (Hernan Bas quoted by Kate Abbey-Lambertz, “Hernan Bas, Painter, Talks Growing Up In Haunted Florida, Working In Detroit”, The Huffington Post, 11 April 2012, online).

Born in 1978 in Miami, Bas typically mixes elements of the real landscapes of his youth and adolescence with other, stranger elements informed by the artist’s various interests in mythology, cinema and paranormal phenomena. Within Bas's dream-like and dark landscape, one can extract fragments of meaning that may reference a nostalgia for childhood fantasies, coming of age adventures, anxiety surrounding the adolescent experience, and burgeoning sexuality. The result in the present work is a queerly enchanting and uncanny scene; the lean figure appearing amongst a mass of rotten and electric vegetation, his vacant expression recalling the late 19^th century Les Nabis style, particularly the decadent art of Caspar David Friedrich. Both Friedrich’s Wanderer above the Sea of Fog and The Ash Tree (At Once a Voice Arose Among the Bleak Twigs Overhead) seem to suggest a scene which is both romantic and fragile, much like the process of maturing.

Making his solo debut in mainland China in 2021, Bas’s “Choose Your Own Adventure” exhibition in Shanghai highlights his alluring figurative paintings and the artist’s invitation to the viewer to take up in his fantastical world of desire and fantasy. Masterfully painted, The Ash Tree (At Once a Voice Arose Among the Bleak Twigs Overhead) is a stunning example of Bas’s depiction of the nascent desire discovered through early adolescence, both transformational and intoxicating.

《梣 樹（頭頂枯枝間頓然響起聲音）》是一幅富有奇幻色彩和表現力的作品，它虛構了一個模糊難辨的空間，撲朔迷離的景象既營造出超現實的氛圍，同時亦勾起一陣似曾相識的感覺。畫中有一名藍衣人獨坐在植物環抱之中，野蠻蔓生的枝葉看起來就像腐爛的植被和意外溢出化學污染品。濃郁稠密的顏色令人不由自主身陷其中，它們美得來勢洶洶，似乎要將畫中人吞噬。藝術家解釋道：

觀者獲邀走進充滿探索精神的神秘叢林，在這個由巴斯主宰的世界裡，感性的天馬行空和青少年歷險故事的碎片俯拾即是。艷麗的顏色令畫面更顯斑斕，但卻破壞了構圖的穩定性，使作品看似熔融不息的湧流，暗示青春易逝，讓人捉摸不透。巴斯筆下的男孩經常處於即將長大成人的蛻變階段，雖說是少年，中性的外貌卻依然雌雄莫辯。本作交織著欲望、自我發現和迷思，呈現出一幅奇幻的景象。

2004年，巴斯入選惠特尼雙年展，此後便憑著糅合歷史與奇幻的畫風，獲得廣泛好評。他的奇幻風景畫擁有豐富的靈感來源，包括十九世紀詩歌和超自然電視節目。他認為，好奇心是塑造其創作手法的主要元素：「我有很多作品（都是關於）要對一切事物保持好奇，而我最感到好奇的是未知的奧秘和超自然世界」（引述自赫爾南・巴斯，凱特・艾比・蘭伯茲撰，〈Hernan Bas, Painter, Talks Growing Up In Haunted Florida, Working In Detroit〉，《The Huffington Post》，2012年4月11日，電子版）。巴斯在1978年生於邁阿密，他將童年和青少年時期所見的真實風景融入創作，再結合他感興趣的神話、電影及超自然現象，創造出彷如夢境的暗黑風景畫，觀者或許可以從中看到藝術家的童年幻想、少年歷險、邁向成年時的焦慮和壓抑不住的性衝動。這些元素在本作中構成了一個詭異卻迷人的場景，藍衣人精瘦的身軀被腐朽的植枝團團包圍，空洞的神情讓人聯想到十九世紀後期的那比派（Les Nabis），還有賈斯帕・大衛・費得利奇作品中的荒涼景致。一如費得利奇《霧海上的旅人》，本作同樣展示了像成長一樣既浪漫又迷惘脆弱的情景。

2021年，巴斯在中國內地舉辦了首場個展，展覽選址上海，名為「選擇你自己的冒險 」，以人像畫向觀者展示了一個飽含欲望與想像的奇幻世界。他在《梣樹（頭頂枯枝間頓然響起聲音）》一作中以純熟精湛的技巧，捕捉了青春期的蠢蠢欲動——生命破繭的一刻稍縱即逝，然而短暫的瞬間反而使成蝶的過程更加觸動人心。