The news has been filled with stories about how this weekend the new Martin Luther King memorial statue will be inaugurated. But the real sad story behind this story is the fact that the statue of Mr. King was actually made in China by a Chinese sculpture. It has been noted that the statue makes Mr King look asian in some respects. This has led some black sculptures to claim that Mr. King would be 'turning over in his grave' if he knew that his memorial would be made by a communist country.
http://www.newsmax.com/US/King-memorial-statue-China/2011/08/23/id/408338The Martin Luther King Memorial was opened to the public on Monday to much fanfare, but one fact was largely overlooked amid the hoopla: The 30-foot statue of King was made in China.
The statue forms the centerpiece of a $120 million, four-acre memorial to the slain civil rights leader on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
The statue, which will be dedicated Sunday, shows King emerging from a mountain of Chinese granite with his arms crossed.
Lei Yixin, a master sculptor from Changsha, China, was commissioned to carry out the work.
“Critics have openly asked why a black, or at least an American, artist was not chosen and even remarked that Dr. King appears slightly Asian in Mr. Lei’s rendering,” The Telegraph reported.
Lei, who has carved two statues of Mao Tse-tung, carried out almost all the work in Changsha. Then more than 150 granite blocks were shipped to Baltimore and reassembled by a team of 100 workers, including 10 Chinese stone masons brought over for the project.
Ed Dwight, a sculptor in Denver, told The Telegraph that King would be “turning over in his grave” if he knew his statue had been sculpted by an artist living under a communist regime.
Lei also has prepared a bronze bust of Barack Obama that he intends to give the president as a gift.
Topic: Even Martin Luther King is 'Made In China' these days (Read 607 times)