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| "Unnecessary Death", Wim Van Aalst, 110x145 cm, oil on panel |
Here, a classical pièta theme is used to express a comtemporary drama: a grieving mother holds her daughter's body, who was murdered by the Chinese autorities because of her belief.
Near her hand rests an origami flower with the chinese characters “zhen”, “shan” and “ren” (truthfulness, benevolence, forbearance), the basic tenets of Falun Gong, a Buddhist selfdiscipline that was banned in China in 1999 when the number of its practitioners had begun to exceed that of Communist Party members.
From one day to the next, 100 million people across China became target of state persecution at the orders of tyrant Jiang Zemin. With too much blood on their hands, Party officials sealed their own regime's fate while they cling to their power hoping to keep the facts of their horrible crimes hidden from the world.
