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发帖数: 2204 | 1 http://news.yahoo.com/mlk-memorial-china-love-121700223.html;_y
MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
MLK Memorial plans have been dogged by controversy over links to China. The
MLK Memorial was built by a Chinese sculptor from Chinese granite. But
backers are pleased with the result.
Christian Science MonitorBy Patrik Jonsson | Christian Science Monitor – 2
hrs 36 mins ago
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The stern, bulky visage of Martin Luther King Jr. now gracing the National
Mall has brought forth tears of joy and redemption from onlookers. But for
some Americans, the massive monument will forever be marred by where it was
made: China.
The MLK Memorial was created by Chinese master sculptor Lei Yixin and the
Dingli Stone Carving Co. out of 159 pieces of pink Chinese granite, and, its
defenders say, is intended to embrace Dr. King's legacy as a global icon.
"Martin Luther King is not only a hero of Americans, he also is a hero of
the world, and he pursued the universal dream of the people of the world,"
Mr. Lei said through a translator in August, before hurricane Irene pushed
back the dedication of the memorial to Oct. 16.
How much do you know about Martin Luther King Jr.? Take our quiz
To be sure, the ultimate arbiters will be onlookers, and so far those
closest to King have been pleased. "This particular artist, he has done a
good job," Martin Luther King III, King's son, told USA Today.
But as America prepares to dedicate its first National Mall monument to an
African-American, the process continues to dog the product.
At issue are two philosophical ideas: One is that a sculptor's job is to
simply put into stone the vision of a patron, and the other is that art is
the reflection of its creator.
It's not the first time such questions have dogged US monument patrons. The
decision to use a French sculptor to carve the likeness of Robert E. Lee for
a late 19th century monument in Richmond, Va., was met with “a lot of
rumbling and grumbling” from Confederate veterans, who argued that only a
Virginian could sculpt an appropriate likeness of Lee, says Kirk Savage, a
University of Pittsburgh art historian.
Mr. Savage, the author of this year's "Monument Wars," a book about the
transformation of the National Mall, sees an equivalent in the debate over a
Chinese sculptor carving King.
“The idea is that a portrait likeness is supposed to be more than the
features of a person, should convey the character or soul of that person,
and that a Chinese person can't do that [with King],” he says. “But the
fact is a competent, good artist can certainly do a better job than somebody
who is not a competent artist, but who has a personal connection.”
IN PICTURES: The MLK Memorial
Someone new to King's legacy, as Lei was, could even offer a fresh look at a
face so familiar to Americans, he adds.
In this case, though, the creator is a state artist who has made dozens of
heroic depictions of Mao Zedong, the brutal founder of Communist China. Seen
this way, the statue is a corruption of King's liberation message and a PR
coup for the Chinese government.
"Why are we letting the symbol of our human rights, the symbol of freedom
for all Americans, to now be partially wiped out by a country – and the
product that came from it – that represents repression and slavery?" asks
Ann Lau, chairman of the Visual Artists Guild, a human rights organization
in Los Angeles.
Since Lei was commissioned for the project in 2006, a coalition of quarrymen
, artists, and Chinese human rights activists have protested the choice and
the fact that American quarry companies weren't allowed to bid on the
project. A federal investigation into the no-bid decision found no
wrongdoing by the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial Project
Foundation, the group tasked with organizing the project.
Concerns have also been raised about the antiquated and dangerous working
conditions of Chinese quarries where the MLK Monument stone was unearthed,
the muscular Socialist Realist style that mirrors landmarks more common in
totalitarian countries, and Lei's lifetime pension from the Chinese
government – a regime that continues to take a hard line against dissenters.
The foundation, which raised most of the $120 million needed to install the
monument, says having the job done in China also had aesthetic and practical
advantages.
“Not only did we need an artist, we needed someone with the means and
methods of putting those large stones together,” Ed Jackson Jr., the
project's executive architect, told The Washington Post ahead of the
original Aug. 28 dedication date. “We don’t do this in America. We don’t
handle stones of this size.”
Foundation officials also said the kind of pink-hued granite needed to fit
into the National Mall color palette was not available in the US.
The technical requirements for the MLK Monument may well have been beyond
the reach of the stone-carving community in America, which hasn't been able
to keep up with demand for larger, more intricate monuments that appeal to
modern donors, and which ultimately require different sets of technical and
artistic skills, adds Savage.
“It doesn't surprise me that they would go to somebody in China,” he says.
“They're still making giant statues of great Communist leaders, and we had
sort of stopped making monuments of that size and scale."
But granite sculptors in Vermont, a group of African-American artists, and
even a bricklayers union, which handed out protest leaflets at the monument
in August, deny these claims. Not only could Americans have done the job,
but the monument also could have been an economic boost to America's
struggling granite quarry business, which has seen large layoffs in recent
years, said stone-carver Clint Button.
"Stone doesn't care what color you are, it tells the truth, and the truth
that this stone tells is indicative of the process, because it missed the
mark, and that's really sad," he says. "Everybody says it's awesome,
incredible, and then they say, 'I can't believe they couldn't find anybody
in America to do it.' "
Those who could have benefited economically from a US-made MLK Monument aren
't the only ones who have been skeptical.
In 2008, the US Commission of Fine Arts criticized the visage, made from a
photograph of King in his Atlanta office, as too grim and totalitarian,
although the King family approved the image. American artists had favored a
warmer, more "intellectual" portrait of King.
The California Chapter of the NAACP in 2007 passed a complaint resolution on
behalf of African-American artists that charged that the foundation "has
chosen to outsource the production of the monument to Dr. King to the People
's Republic of China … which is an affront to the ideal of human dignity."
"Surely, having a black sculptor of a black civil rights icon – working on
ground once toiled by black slaves, on the National Mall, designed and
surveyed with the help of a black mathematician and astronomer Benjamin
Banneker – would have added to the King memorial’s symbolic power," wrote
Washington Post columnist Courtland Milloy.
The conflict comes at a time of deep insecurity in the US about its role in
the world compared with China. In July, a Pew Research Center survey found a
stunning statistic. The percentage of Americans who believe China has or is
about to overshadow the US increased from 33 percent to 46 percent between
2009 and 2011.
Foundation members have also pushed back at criticism of Lei as the
principal sculptor. "My response to critics who question why we chose a
Chinese sculptor is Dr. King's words themselves, that we should not judge a
person by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,"
foundation director Harry Johnson said in defense of the memorial.
What's more, a USA Today poll showed that 7 in 10 Americans are very or
somewhat interested in visiting Lei's sculpture.
But American artists and quarry men haven't given up. Their goal is to build
enough public sentiment against the MLK Monument to have it torn out and
replaced by another rock, hewn in America, by Americans.
"Dr. King is held in bondage by his own arms, he'll never be free at last,"
said Mr. Button, the South Carolina stone carver. "He's always going to be
made in China."
IN PICTURES: Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial | p*******r
发帖数: 2204 | 2 照片连接
http://www.csmonitor.com/CSM-Photo-Galleries/In-Pictures/Martin
The
2
【在 p*******r 的大作中提到】
: http://news.yahoo.com/mlk-memorial-china-love-121700223.html;_y
: MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
: MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
: MLK Memorial plans have been dogged by controversy over links to China. The
: MLK Memorial was built by a Chinese sculptor from Chinese granite. But
: backers are pleased with the result.
: Christian Science MonitorBy Patrik Jonsson | Christian Science Monitor – 2
: hrs 36 mins ago
: tweet3
: Share1
| p*****p
发帖数: 19331 | 3 老新闻了
就是made in china的艺术品 | p*****p
发帖数: 19331 | 4 为什么不用一块黑石头雕呢？
弄块白的，数百年后的小盆友以为他是白人呢 | O*******d
发帖数: 20343 | 5 "But American artists and quarry men haven't given up. Their goal is to
buildenough public sentiment against the MLK Monument to have it torn out
and replaced by another rock, hewn in America, by Americans."
This is why America declines. Everything is political. | f*****Q
发帖数: 1912 | 6 费城的自由钟是英国来的，纽约的自由女神是法国来的，国会顶上的那个Statue of
Freedom是意大利来的。再多一个中国来的也没啥吧？ | t*n
发帖数: 14458 | 7 民主国家不能用集权国家的
费城的自由钟是英国来的，纽约的自由女神是法国来的，国会顶上的那个Statue of
Freedom是意大利来的。再多一个中国来的也没啥吧？
【在 f*****Q 的大作中提到】
: 费城的自由钟是英国来的，纽约的自由女神是法国来的，国会顶上的那个Statue of
: Freedom是意大利来的。再多一个中国来的也没啥吧？
| a***e
发帖数: 27968 | 8 万国来潮，挺好
话说朝战纪念碑是华裔设计
这次更进一步而已
按老将理论，只有水深火热的独裁国家人民才能深刻感受mlk
这帮人怎么这么不懂事
【在 f*****Q 的大作中提到】
: 费城的自由钟是英国来的，纽约的自由女神是法国来的，国会顶上的那个Statue of
: Freedom是意大利来的。再多一个中国来的也没啥吧？
| d****n
发帖数: 2276 | 9 最搞笑的 是 黑人反对中国人为反对种族主义的马丁路德塑像的原因是因为作者不是黑
人.
太 ft了
The
2
【在 p*******r 的大作中提到】
: http://news.yahoo.com/mlk-memorial-china-love-121700223.html;_y
: MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
: MLK Memorial: From China, with love?
: MLK Memorial plans have been dogged by controversy over links to China. The
: MLK Memorial was built by a Chinese sculptor from Chinese granite. But
: backers are pleased with the result.
: Christian Science MonitorBy Patrik Jonsson | Christian Science Monitor – 2
: hrs 36 mins ago
: tweet3
: Share1
| z*****a
发帖数: 3809 | 10 Exactly
【在 d****n 的大作中提到】
: 最搞笑的 是 黑人反对中国人为反对种族主义的马丁路德塑像的原因是因为作者不是黑
: 人.
: 太 ft了
:
: The
: 2
| h***o
发帖数: 5030 | 11 的钱
该有多好
【在 t*n 的大作中提到】
: 民主国家不能用集权国家的
:
: 费城的自由钟是英国来的，纽约的自由女神是法国来的，国会顶上的那个Statue of
: Freedom是意大利来的。再多一个中国来的也没啥吧？
|
|
