GAO's "THE EXECUTION OF CHRIST"
Posted on 06/22/2018 6:58:08 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
It might be decades since the Cultural Revolution, but Gao has never quite been able to leave his past behind. He still feels haunted by what he imagines as the more egalitarian and democratic country that China could have become, had it not been sent off-course by the political violence of the 20th century.
Among his most famous works is “Miss Mao”, a series of sculptures of the eponymous Communist leader with a Pinocchio-nose and pert breasts, a reference to the party’s uncanny “reproductive” abilities, says Gao.
“Even though Mao has died...the Mao era is not over yet. The systems that Mao set up are still here,” he explains. “To us, he has just changed. He is no longer as serious. He is more cartoonish, more humorous. But the essence of him is still here.”
As for many artists of his generation, the massacre of students and pro-democracy protesters in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989 was a pivotal moment in his life. A photograph of a young, long-haired Gao standing insouciantly in the square is on prominent display near the entrance to his apartment. In the decades since, however, he has found it increasingly difficult to convince the literati circles around him of the party’s autocratic tendencies.
The “Execution of Christ”, one of his sculptures that is still kept at home, depicts seven geriatric-looking Maos, cast in bronze, pointing bayonets and rifles at a supplicant Jesus Christ, his palms bleeding from the crucifixion.
Despite the emigration of many of his friends and his brother in the past few years, Gao says he will remain in Beijing: “I want to be able to sell to Chinese people. My art is for China,” he says. “But no one here, understandably, will buy it.”
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
With great dignity he holds his art - starting down a tank for eternity.
With great dignity he holds his art - staring down a tank for eternity.
Moreover Xi has had himself written into the Constitution as well. He is the new Mao.
ok, that statue is just bizarre. I’m not posting it!
Majority of Chinese people have profound respect for Mao.
The so-called Christian artist
had better not abuse the Christian identity.
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