The seizure by Hong Kong police of a sculpture commemorating the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre only made the work “bigger and bigger”, according to the artist.
“It’s a strange thing in art,” said Danish sculptor Jens Galschiøt, creator of The Pillar of Shame, told Artnet News. “Here, the art is not the real object, but the movement that surrounds it. Now the Hong Kong government and police have created a new part of my works in Hong Kong. It’s an endless story. »
The 23-foot-tall monumental Galschiøt sculpture was seized by the Hong Kong Police’s National Security Department on May 5 in connection with a “subversion incitement case”, according to a statement from the government.
Danish artist Jens Galschiøt holds a miniature pillar of shame outside the Chinese Embassy during the Resist the Chinese Communist Party protest, a joint gathering of Ukrainian, Hong Kong and Tibetan protesters calling for the Resist the CCP protest on Chinese National Day. Photo: May James/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images.
THE pillar of shame was created and first erected in Hong Kong just before the UK ceded control of the city to China in 1997. The following year it was taken to the campus of the University of Hong Kong, where he stood until the end of 2021, when the University ordered the work to be removed after the dissolution of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China.
The Alliance, a pro-democracy organization that for three decades had held an annual vigil in memory of the victims of the 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square, worked with Galschiøt to place the sculpture. The group folded amid a police investigation after its leaders were arrested and charged with inciting ‘subversion’ in 2021 under a sweeping national security law implemented in Hong Kong in 2020.
Although the Alliance helped install and maintain the structure, Galschiøt maintains that he is the rightful owner. And it has been kept in the dark about its fate since it was removed from public view, he said, only to learn that police took possession of the sculpture from the media.
“They didn’t tell me anything, didn’t write to me. I have no information,” Galschiøt said, calling the seizure of his artwork “scandalous.” He was try to recover and bring it back to Europe, fearing that the authorities would destroy it, but his efforts were in vain.
The upper half of pillar of shame be moved by workers for further transport. Hong Kong authorities have demolished a public sculpture dedicated to victims of the Tiananmen Square massacre, accelerating a campaign to erase the crackdown from public memory and eradicate dissent in a city that was until recently one of the most free from Asia.
Photo: Alex Chan/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images.
Although The Pillar of Shame can no longer be seen in Hong Kong, Galschiøt has tried to keep the work visible across a campaign based on augmented reality and making the 3D print design available for download online. A replica of the sculpture will be installed in the forecourt of the Axel Springer building in Berlin as part of an initiative by the Axel Springer Freedom Foundation and the artist, who will participate in a round table after the opening of the exhibition on May 22. The work will be visible until the end of June.
The seizure drew criticism from civil rights organizations overseas. The Prague-based nonprofit Ngo Dei, which has many Hong Kongers among its members, accused the government of infringing on artistic freedom and launched an online petition condemning its actions.
“This is another example of how Hong Kong’s national security law has criminalized all facets of freedom of expression, including artistic expression,” said policy manager Nik Williams. and campaigns at Index on Censorship. The London non-profit last year published a report on how artists and cultural organizations based in Europe are increasingly engaging in self-censorship to avoid angering Beijing.
“For decades, The Pillar of Shame has been a powerful symbol illuminating how art can respond to state repression,” Williams said. “In recent years, and since the National Security Act was passed, it has taken on renewed prominence, highlighting how the state has begun to target artists, journalists and civil society more broadly. Art is not a crime.”
But the Hong Kong government retaliate on Saturday, saying the allegations were “seriously unfounded”, “misleading” and made “under the guise of artistic freedom”, adding that the “collection of evidence” was “lawful, reasonable and rational”. He says that although the national security law states that the rights and freedoms enjoyed by Hong Kong residents must be respected and protected, “these rights and freedoms are not absolute”.
An archive image of the The Pillar of Shame when it was first erected in Hong Kong in 1997 during the Tiananmen Vigil in Victoria Park. Courtesy of the artist.
Galschiøt still hopes to bring the sculpture back to Europe, even if it’s after the trial is over. He is currently writing a letter to the Hong Kong government, again emphasizing that the artwork is his property and was installed when Hong Kong was still under British rule.
The sculptor also warns that the problem is much larger than the immediate circumstances of The Pillar of Shame. If the treatment of his work is an indicator, “I must assume that no art museum, gallery, art collector, exhibition venue, and especially major international auction houses, will be able to exist in Hong Kong without complete self-censorship” , did he declare. “If you can be accused [for] exhibit or show a work of art that criticizes China, or maybe just criticizes, then the art scene in Hong Kong is completely dead.
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