By Laurie Chen<\/p>\n
BEIJING, March 30 (Reuters) – Chinese dissident artist Gao Zhen, famous for making provocative satirical sculptures of former leader Mao Zedong, was tried on Monday over accusations of “defaming national heroes and martyrs”, \u200chis wife and a rights group said.<\/p>\n
Gao, 69, who was detained in 2024 during a visit from the \u200cU.S., faces a maximum three-year prison sentence, said his wife Zhao Yaliang and Shane Yi, a researcher at the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group \u200bwhich operates outside the country.<\/p>\n
The closed-door, one-day trial took place at Sanhe City People’s Court in Hebei province neighbouring the capital Beijing, and ended without a verdict, Zhao and Yi told Reuters, citing information from his lawyers.<\/p>\n
Zhao said she was barred from entering the courtroom. Verdicts are often announced months later in such trials.<\/p>\n
The Sanhe Public Security Bureau did not immediately respond to \u200ca request for comment on his case.<\/p>\n
The \u2060New York-based artist was detained in August 2024 on a family visit to China even though since moving to the U.S. in 2022, he had made multiple trips to China without \u2060issues, Yi added.<\/p>\n
“This really shows the Chinese government’s logic, when they want to target someone, they can use anything in their power to do so,” she said.<\/p>\n
“Gao Zhen is an artist. He has a right to artistic freedom, period.”<\/p>\n
With his brother Gao Qiang, \u200bGao produced \u200bseveral provocative sculptures of Mao that critiqued the 1966-1976 Cultural \u200bRevolution, a period of social turmoil and widespread \u200cpolitical persecution in China that led to millions of deaths.<\/p>\n
European Union diplomats tried to attend the trial but were blocked from entering, its China mission said in an official X post.<\/p>\n
MOCKING MAO<\/p>\n
Their most famous works include “Miss Mao”, featuring Mao with unsettling features like Pinocchio noses and breasts, and “Mao’s Guilt”, a bronze statue of the leader kneeling remorsefully.<\/p>\n
Gao’s wife said she and their seven-year-old son, an American citizen, are under exit bans and cannot leave China.<\/p>\n
“This is a huge blow to \u200cme,” Zhao told Reuters. “My son hasn’t seen his father since the year \u200bbefore last, and we have been barred from sending letters to him \u200bsince last May. It’s had a significant impact \u200bon my son’s emotions and health.”<\/p>\n
Gao is suffering from malnutrition and has lumbar spine disease, as \u200cwell as chronic knee and eye conditions that \u200bneed treatment, Yi said.<\/p>\n
Gao was \u200bcharged for works between 2005 and 2009, Yi said, while China’s “Law on the Protection of Heroes and Martyrs” was only established in 2018 and strengthened in 2021.<\/p>\n
The law has previously been used to prosecute individuals accused of \u200binsulting servicemen and military members who \u200cdied in the line of duty, as well as historical figures.<\/p>\n
A stand-up comedian was censored and his \u200bcomedy firm fined $2 million in 2021 after he made a joke that referenced a People’s Liberation Army \u200bslogan.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Laurie Chen; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Alexandra Hudson)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Laurie Chen BEIJING, March 30 (Reuters) – Chinese dissident artist Gao Zhen, famous for making provocative satirical…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":576325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[449,458,459,64,63,512,282738,282735,460,134,282737,282733,174993,282736,282734],"class_list":["post-576324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-china","tag-china-mission","tag-chinese-human-rights-defenders","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-gao-qiang","tag-gao-zhen","tag-mao-zedong","tag-shane-yi","tag-zhao-yaliang"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=576324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/576325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}