美国宾夕法尼亚州的匹兹堡是一座中型城市，它位于三条大河之间、阿巴拉契亚山脉山脚下。匹兹堡拥有若干闻名天下的出口产品：钢铁、美式足球和安迪·沃霍尔。城区和郊区人口共200多万，但这一数量每年都在缓慢地递减，因此常与“铁锈地带”(rust belt)的临近城市克里夫兰、底特律和水牛城一起被人们称为繁华已逝的都市，作为曾经的工业重镇，匹兹堡正寻求新的发展。匹兹堡有独特的地域文化，但普通人的生活状况和居住条件如何?他们的生活动力、创造力来自何方，是什么让他们活出意义?这些方面都鲜为人知，也鲜有人问津。

　　第九届上海双年展上，乔恩·鲁本负责的匹兹堡馆将探索一个普通匹兹堡家庭的生活和传统。

　　匹兹堡位于宾夕法尼亚州的西部地区，该地区老龄人口数量在全美仅次于佛罗里达州被誉为退休人士乐土的棕榈滩县。这里的遗产交易活动非常普遍，很多人把祖上一生积攒下来的全部物品都拿出来卖，然后用卖房所得来补贴家人用度。

　　乔恩·鲁本此次为布置匹兹堡馆展览，购买了洛瓦西克(Lovasik)家族的一批物品，这户美国人家是斯洛伐克后裔，几代人一直住在匹兹堡以北几分钟车程的工业城。他们的住房由族长在1914年(安迪·沃霍尔的父亲同年从斯洛伐克迁居匹兹堡)建成，一楼是家族用来做生意的门面，曾经改装成百货店和肉铺;二楼有两间卧室。洛瓦西克家族的物品包括各类家具、一套玩具火车、一些塑制雕像、珠宝、一台洗碗机，以及一些更为私人的物品，如照相册、结婚证、个人文件和家族中一位牧师撰写的数百本宗教书籍。这些物品为我们讲述了一个穿越好几代人家族传奇故事。

　　“洛瓦西克的房产销售”(The Lovasik Estate Sale)是一件占据匹兹堡馆全部空间的装置艺术作品，展现了洛瓦西克原住房出售时发现和整理过的全部物品。在此次展览中，原住房中的每间屋子都开辟为独立区域，观众可以播放高品质录放机或随意翻阅相册，如同在友人家中一般，随意发掘物品。

　　重要的是，以现实拍卖会的形式呈现装置艺术有两大益处。观众在欣赏展览的过程中，可将住房中的物品买回家(值得一提的是，很多物品原产于中国)。随着展览的进行，装置艺术的规模会不断缩小，最后一场拍卖会将在双年展的最后一天进行。拍卖会的所得将用于创作一件反映上海日常生活的作品，并会在2013年在匹兹堡举办的展览中展出。

　　匹兹堡馆的创意旨在为这座美国都市留下一张独特的速写，它展现了一个家族的全部生活。同时它也用一种独特的方式呈现了世界一角重新分配财产的活动，这个角落乍看陌生，再看则似曾相识。正是以这种方式，匹兹堡的设计者将一户美国本地居民的物品和文化散播到展览参观者的生活和文化中，巧妙地消解了亲切和生疏之间的距离。

　　一个人一生缓慢积累起来的个人财产常常被视作个人内在成长的外在表现，这些财产犹如第二个体，与个人身份的关系错综复杂。“洛瓦西克的房产销售”提出这样一个问题：当我们去世后，这个个体会发生什么?在创造价值和意义的过程中，家庭、文化和商业行为扮演了什么样的角色?我们人生中积累的物质如何重新分配并融入到其他人的生活中?这次销售的收入会用于2013年将在匹兹堡举办的关于上海房产销售的续展。

　　Chelsea Haines

　　Pittsburgh，Pennsylvania is a mid-sized American city located between three major rivers and settled in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains，a city best known for a few choice exports: steel，American football，Andy Warhol.With a slowly declining greater metropolitan area population of little over two million，it is often considered along with its “rust belt” neighbors—Cleveland，Detroit，Buffalo—a city past its prime，a former industrial powerhouse trying to reinvent itself.What is less explored or known about Pittsburgh is its unique local culture，the ways that ordinary people live their lives，what homes they keep，what inspires them，makes them creative and adds meaning to everyday life.

　　The Pittsburgh Pavilion at the 9th Shanghai Biennale is a commission by artist Jon Rubin that explores the life and legacy of one ordinary family in Pittsburgh.

　　The area of western Pennsylvania where Pittsburgh is located has one of the highest elderly populations in the United States，second only to the retirement haven of Palm Beach County，Florida.Estate sales are an extremely common phenomenon in the region，a process by which the entire contents of an individual’s life is put on sale for anyone to purchase，with proceeds benefiting remaining family members.

　　For the Pittsburgh Pavilion，Jon Rubin purchased the estate of the Lovasik family，an American family of Slovak descent who lived for generations in a house in an old mill town minutes north of Pittsburgh.Built by the family patriarch in 1914 (the same year Andy Warhol’s father moved to Pittsburgh from Slovakia)，the home had a ground floor that doubled as the family business，once a grocery store and butcher shop，and an upper level two-bedroom home.The Lovasik family’s objects tell a long domestic story that spans the range of several generations and include furniture，a toy train set，plastic figurines，jewelry，and a dishwasher to more personal artifacts，including photo albums，a marriage certificate，personal files and hundreds of religious books written by a priest in the family.

　　The Lovasik Estate Sale，an installation taking up the entirety of the Pittsburgh Pavilion，displays all the objects in the Lovasik home as they were found and arranged during the original estate sale.Each room in the house has its own section in the exhibition，and visitors are encouraged to explore the objects as they would in a friend’s home—by playing the hi-fi record player or browsing through photo albums.

　　Importantly，the installation serves a double function as an actual estate sale.Over the course of the exhibition，visitors may purchase objects from the estate and take them home (notably，many of the objects in the estate were originally manufactured in China).The installation will shrink as the exhibition continues，and the final object sale will take place on the last day of the biennale.The proceeds of the sale will go into the production of a subsequent exhibition representing everyday Shanghai life in Pittsburgh in 2013.

　　The aim of the pavilion is to display a particular portrait of Pittsburgh—a biography of a family’s entire life—and a way of redistributing their possessions in an area of the world that may seem foreign at first，but universally familiar upon further inspection.In this way the Pittsburgh Pavilion ideally dissolves this space between the familiar and foreign by dispersing the remnants of one Pittsburgh family’s life and local culture into the many lives and cultures of those who visit the exhibition.

　　An individual’s possessions slowly accumulated over the course of a life often become an outward projection of an evolving inner self，entangling one’s identity like a second body.The Lovasik Estate Sale asks what happens to this body when we are gone?What role do family，culture，and commerce have in creating value and meaning，and how does the material accumulation of our lives become dispersed and reintegrated into the lives of others?The proceeds of the sale will go into the production of a subsequent exhibition of a Shanghai estate in Pittsburgh in 2013.