The King Memorial … outsourced to China?
August 10, 2007 at 11:20 am by Scott Freeman in NewsThe decision to name a Chinese sculptor, who lives in mainland China and is known for his sculptures of Chairman Mao, to design and sculpt the memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. planned in Washington D.C. has prompted a rising storm of protest.
Gilbert Young is a legendary black artist who grew up in Cincinnati, and now lives in Atlanta. He has emerged as one of the most vocal critics of the decision by the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial Foundation to hire Lei Yixin. Young has created a website, King Is Ours, that has become the Internet epicenter of the protests.
“It’s one of the most immoral acts I could think of,” Young tells CL. “If an all-white organization had chosen an Asian person of another country to do this sculpture, Jesse Jackson and everybody else would’ve been in the streets. Instead they’ve been quiet, giving this a pass. Well, I’m not.”
Young says the foundation is comprised of members of Alpha Phi Alpha, one of the country’s oldest African-American fraternities. The foundation originally selected sculptor (and the first black astronaut) Ed Dwight to design the memorial that will reside along the Tidal Basin between the Jefferson and Lincoln memorials. But Dwight was removed from the project over creative differences.
Dwight thinks something deeper was at hand. He told the Los Angeles Times that he was told the foundation hopes the choice of a Chinese sculptor will persuade the Chinese government to give $25 million to the King Memorial fund, which needs to raise $100 million.
A spokeswoman for the foundation told the Times there have been no discussions with the Chinese government, and no donations.
“I believe Ed,” says Young. “He told me everything that went down, and it all rings true.”
The foundation’s spokeswoman also told the Times that Lei Yixin was selected “on his artistic ability and experience carving large-scale granite projects. … We did not select a sculptor based on politics, country of origin or financial incentives.”
Young, however, is offended that the foundation selected Lei Yixin. “The most grievous sin is these black men could have gotten together and said, ‘We could not find any blacks qualified to do the memorial.’ That’s insane.”
Also insane, according to Young, is the foundation’s decision to use granite from China for the memorial. “We have beautiful stone right here in Georgia, and I know that some of the quarries offered granite at cost just so they could be involved,” he says.
“The worst thing as an artist and a black person is they took away my birthright to be first in line,” says Young. “Dr. King fought for the rights of black people in this country to have the fair opportunity to be equal. They selected an Asian from China, a country that has killed millions of their own people. They don’t believe in Christianity and they don’t believe in freedom. Giving my history away to someone from another country to interpret, I have a problem with that.”
August 10th, 2007 at 5:01 pm
All I have to say is Amen to Gilbert Young. It’s a disgrace, and once again it’s all about $$$. The only question I have, is I wonder if they’re getting their granite from the same place that Decatur contracted to for the redesign of the MARTA station.
I guess Lithonia granite was good enough for the Lincoln Memorial, but not good enough for a commemoration of Georgia’s native son.
August 10th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
Chairman Mao? a sculptor who sculpted the image of Chairman Mao? Why not give the contract to an artist who sculpted the image of Saddam Hussein? What would America have to say about that? Do the people who chose this sculptor realize the million whose deaths Chairman Mao was responsible for in Tibet? When will people learn that sometimes money isn’t the reason for making a decision.
August 11th, 2007 at 11:07 am
1) Making sweeping generalizations about how Chinese people “don’t believe in Christianity or freedom” – is that something Dr. King would back?
2) Does Young want the right to be “fair and equal” or does he want the right to be “first in line”?
3) What if Indians had protested when Dr. King took inspiration from Gandhi? What if they had complained about their history being given away for “someone else to interpret”?
August 12th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
“birthright”….because I’m black….says a lot…a lot that Dr. King spoke eloquently of his disagreement with….
Artists in China who refused to sculpt Chairman Mao, didn’t have a very long life expectancy. I can’t expect modern Americans to understand that reality. As vicious as the treatment of Black Americans was, it is nothing compared to what has happened in China for decades since Mao. By all means, punish the artist by associating him with Mao. I don’t know his personal beliefs, but neither do you.
I don’t necessarily agree with the choice, but it is the choice of the foundation. Freedom of choice is THE building block of our nation. If the Chinese sculptor is the best at this, then I say that Dr. King should receive the very best. If not, go find the best, regardless of race. Period.
August 23rd, 2007 at 10:00 pm
We don’t know each other, so I will introduce myself. My names is Gilbert Young and I am a 66 year old African American artist. My work is considered “socially conscious”. For more than 50 years I’ve created artwork that glorifies the beauty, the history, and the culture of African American people. My work is sold in galleries and gift shops around the world. My pieces have been in movies, and used as set decorations on television shows. I have been commissioned by organizations worldwide to create commemorative works of art. Procter & Gamble commissioned me to create the Salute to Greatness Award presented by the King Center here in Atlanta.
I am old enough to have witnessed first hand prejudice, bigotry and Jim Crow, and I survived it with bitter memories. If you’ll remember your history you will hear only truth when I say that African Americans are not native to this country. We are not immigrants. We did not choose to come here. Our ancestors were brought here by force. Our most indelible footprint in history is that we as a people are the descendents of those who survived the horrendous institution known as the system of American Slavery.
There are those whose names run through the history books, Carver, Booker T. Washington, Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman and others. Our country makes an effort to recognize them one month each year. You’ll see their accomplishments condensed into a sentence or two, “…one hundred uses for the peanut…”
But that changed nearly 8 years ago. A handful of black men went to Congress to ask permission to build a monument to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.–African American man and descendent of slaves. He was to be immortalized in a national monument in the capitol city of what is known as the most powerful nation on the planet. His monument would stand throughout time on the National Mall among America’s greatest statesmen. African American History would be important to our nation 365 days a year.
But through misguidence and greed and ignorance and apathy, a few folk decided to hand this most important commission, this most incredible honor of sculpting the centerpiece of the monument to an artist whose claim to fame are his statues in China of the mass murderer Mao Tse Tung. A deal was made for the stone for Dr. King’s monument to come from China, quarried using slave labor. The workers are not even provided proper masks to keep the killing silica dust from their lungs. No granite company in the USA was even allowed to bid on this project before it was outsourced directly to China.
Dale wrote, “if the Chinese sculptor is the best…Dr. King should receive the very best”. You presume too much, but you’re not alone. The King Foundation board members join you in that mistake. In case you have not heard, Yixin is said to have been recommended by a group of his peers. In an article in the Los Angeles Times, he said he was napping in the grass and was approached by the members who offered him the job. Yixin said he had no idea how important the job was until he saw the plan.
Who in their right mind would presume someone is qualified for a job of this importance? Have you seen Yixin’s King? Does it look like King to you?
Cloudspitter wrote about “sweeping accusations about Chinsese people…” We’re talking about the Chinese GOVERNMENT, whose history is recorded as one of the most brutal and inhumane in this planet’s history. Lei receives a stipend from that same goverment. He is supported by it and has created numerous commemorations to Mao. How do you compare King and Ghandi to Yixin? Dr. King took inspiration from Ghandi. This is not about Yixin or China taking INSPIRATION from African Americans. They are taking more than that.
Lest we forget, Dr. King didn’t die. King was murdered. He was in Memphis to lead a protest against the way garbage collectors–”colored” garbage collectors–were being treated. It’s true, Dr. King’s hope was that someday black people would have the same opportunities as all other people. He hoped that African Americans would be able to attend the same schools, worship in the same churches, live in the same neighborhoods, get the same jobs for the same pay as others. Yet here is our very first (and last?) opportunity to display our culture and heritage in the first ever monument to an African American man and we’re being told we’re still not good enough.
It seems that as the King Foundation is concerned there is nothing wrong with Dr. King’s monument being “Made In China.” They’re wrong. They’re wrong for the sake of our nation, our people, our history, and our children.
We as African American people should be allowed to take the lead in this first opportunity to honor our beloved hero. We as a people DO care that someone who has sculpted memorials to a mass murderer has been given the honor of sculpting Dr. King. WE THE PEOPLE WILL NOT ALLOW someone from a communist country who knows nothing about the Civil Rights Movement, nothing about Dr. King, and nothing about what King stood for to have his named carved into Chinese granite in the first monument to an African American national hero in the history of this planet. It may be OK with some, but it is not OK with us.
King is ours.
Gilbert Young
Lea Winfrey Young
& Hundreds of others….
August 24th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
Don’t get stuck in playing the race card which the media will trivalize because this is a black-on-black issue. Instead, let’s take this to a higher level by focusing on what is flawed – the process! Dr. King stood for fairness and that did not happen in choosing the Sculptor of Record for the National Memorial project. First the Alpha brothers and the National Memorial Foundation used a wonderful sculptor – Ed Dwight – to design the pose that would be used on National Mall. He even made some 900 mini-models for major donors. When it was time to select the builder for his design, the procedure for most monuments… Dwight and a few members of the project (Ed Jackson, for example) found what they wanted in Lei Yixen in June 2006. Lei was in Minnesota attending a six-week stone carving project with other stone carvers from around the world. Even though granite could have been found in Georgia (what a coup that would have been for King’s state), the King Memorial group decided to have Lei build the Stone of Hope and Mountain of Despair in Chinia and ship it in 100 crates. Then Lei and his team will come to America and assemble it here. Just imagine what would have happened if the King National Memorial Foundation had done what it did for the design of the site on the National Mall. The group put out a “Call for Artists,” got 900 applicants who paid $75 each, netted at least $67,000, and nair a complaint when the white winner (the San Francisco Roma Group) was announced. Interestingly, go to the King Memorial website and try to find anything now about the Roma group. But the point is… a fair competition was not held for the monuments to be placed on the beautifully located site on the National Mall. And that’s too ball… What a missed opportunity for hundreds of beautifully trained sculptors, regardless of race. Instead of a fair competition, we’re left talking about the race of the sculptor. But, the worse thing about all of this is that Lei Yixin has coopted the very pose that Ed Dwight developed. For this he gets $132,000. For full details see http://www.thegibsonreport.today.com and learn more about the 9-18-07 New York fundraiser protest. Let’s hope the King Memorial groups does the right thing real soon – pay Ed Dwight $143,000, put him down as Sculptor of Record, and list Lei Yixin as builder.
August 25th, 2007 at 10:52 am
From my objective view, I see blacks being racist in this matter. Just as it is alright for Mayor Ray Nagin to call New Orleans a “Chocolate City”, but is racist for a white person like myself to use the same description. When the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was planned, there were many ‘Namvets who could have done the design. Instead it was “outsourced” to a Vietnamese artist. While many of us didn’t like the final design, (black stone, below ground like a grave, etc), the selection of the artist was non partisan and fine with me. So long as blacks claim so, there will continue to be a race problem. Far too many blacks love it that the liberal, mostly Democrat, politicians tell them: “We understand that you are not as good as whites, so we will give you Affirmative Action, and allow you to take on positions that you couldn’t otherwise attain.” I would be outraged if someone told me that I need special favors to make it in the world.
nuf sed
August 25th, 2007 at 4:00 pm
At Denver’s City Park, there used to be a statue of Dr. King done by a black “artist”. It stood for years and was one of the worst renditions of Dr. King I had ever seen, but you see the powers that were at the time wanted the statue done by a black “artist”, and so it was.
The statue became a laughing stock, it looked like Dr. Zais (sic) of The Planet of the Apes” and was finally taken down for good, don’t know where it ended it’s life.
Now Mr. Young thinks he should be awarded the contract to do this likeness, only because he is black. Can you imagine the hue and cry from the black race if all civic contracts were awarded upon color, no matter the talent level?
Of course it was Mr. Young who said and I quote “They keep telling me, “King was for everyone, and I tell them , NO, he was not for everyone, he was for fairness and justice” I would love Mr. Young to tell me just what that means.
T Bellomo Denver
August 25th, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Bigot hypocrites who claim to know what Martin Luther King was all about amuse me. Way to go…increase that racial division that you rail against. As long as people like Gilbert Young have the bully pulpit, we will never live in the colorblind world Dr. King dreamed of.
August 25th, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Noooooooooooo, black people are incapable of being racist… By the people–for the people! Way to show those true colors there, Gilbert.
August 27th, 2007 at 5:56 am
In Germany before 1933, more and more jewish and communist artists took over the artworld of beautiful Germany.
Adolf Hitler claimed to make art again of pure race.
Interestingly the Youngs are using in there argumentation no other thermonology than a member of a fascist Nazi party.
What is there next step. Put all chinese people into a concentration camp.
Leave them alone. “I have a dream”.. where mankind can live in peace and harmony……..
or
It proofs again Hitler was right.
“The world is a battle of races.”( Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf)
September 9th, 2007 at 7:24 pm
To Gilbert Young:
Dr. King would hate you! You are limiting him in the united states, but he wants to go everywhere, expecially his spirit!
“It’s ours” this is what you are claiming. Please keep in mind that all the right you have today is not only because lots of black people fought during those days, but also because a lots of white people said “It’s not only ours! It’s everyone’s!” Please show your respect to these white people while you are respecting Dr. King. Don’t forget them! I appreciate if someones list those names out following my reply.
There are many wars in Africa. All of us are showing sympathy to those people who are killed. But .to Chinese, you are leading others to ignore those people who are killed. Your eyes are so selective! This definitely shows you are racism to chinese. Even, you are saying this for sculpting Dr. King’s statue. You are insulting Dr. King!
I appreciate if someone posts my above words everythere.
January 7th, 2008 at 12:13 am
OK- I’m a white guy- in fact, I’m the US Granite Industry Liaison to Gilbert Young and King Is Ours. And for the record, I called him because I knew I was uniquely qualified on this matter.
My name is Clint Button, US Granite Industry to King Is Ours. I am also a full time US Granite Industry Sculptor www. carolinasculpturestudio. com, one of only a dozen left in the USA. Too many people are taking the easy route and biting the hook baited with the racist card. That is a simplistic trap. There’s more to this than that for anyone who wants to know the full truth.
At our Nov 8, 2007 Press Conference in Barre, VT- the Granite Center of the World- sponsored by the Barre Granite Association, we stood in front of a 24 ft tall granite statue with the three men that carved it- one being my cousin that apprenticed me. Nearly a dozen US Master Sculptors and Carvers surrounded us that day. None of us were ever allowed to bid. No one in the USA, granite industry, African American Art Community or otherwise, was ever allowed to bid. Reported efforts to look in the US for qualified resources were never intended to produce results- only serving as token visits. Don’t believe the hype.
Responding to that press conference- of our craft in America, MLK Foundation CEO Harry Johnson said, “It is a lost art, if you will.” Denied is different than lost. He is lying and he is doing it on purpose. He also trades all kinds of descriptions trying to cover this fumble, first saying Lei was not chosen because of King’s message, then saying King was for everyone.
On MLK Day, Jan 21, 2008, Gilbert Young and I will stand in Elberton, GA- the Granite Capitol of the World, sponsored by the Elberton Granite Association- with US Granite Industry African American Stonecutters. They are infuriated that, although they work not two hours from Dr. King’s home in Atlanta, their region was never even contacted to bid on the project. Stone Mountain region visits claimed made by the MLK Foundation are a sham- no quarries have operated there since the 1970’s, with all manufacturing operations reverting to Elberton by mutual agreement at that time. Furthermore, no quarries in the US operate on Sundays.
Together, the BGA and EGA represent nearly 170 member companies and 2500 employees. Other companies, who are not members, also operate in conjunction with these organizations. Not a single one got to bid or even see project specifications. The project was definitively outsourced.
The King Is Ours protest is based on a flawed process that denied ALL Americans a fair and open opportunity to participate. Since $10 Million was supplied by Congress, that means we get a chance to participate in the entire process- not just what’s left after the best is already given away. Period.
African American Sculptor Ed Dwight was originally recruited as Artist of Record. Lei was to translate Dwight’s scale model into granite. When Dwight criticized Lei’s revision of his model, Dwight was fired and Lei promoted to Artist of Record. Lei was not chosen by competition or even portfolio review following an RFQ (Request for Qualifications) competition. He was taking a nap on the lawn at an art/stone sculpture symposium after finishing his first ever self-admitted solo carving when found him. Then they say they first met him as they woke him up and sent him home with a check for $132K. When no one else ever had a chance, that is not a fair process.
Even Lei’s artisan peers in China speak of him good, not great and just lucky, saying any of a number of Chinese sculptors could do the project. Our contention is that there are many Americans who could as well.
There isn’t a black-granite-sculptor-doing-colossal-works-in-the-USA, now but there are non-white, portfolio qualified Master Sculptors still waiting for the rightful chance to compete for inclusion in this project. We are all equal because we were all denied without prejudice. If we had been underbid, we would not have a valid complaint. But that is not what happened. A multi ethnic project, including an African American Artist of Record supported by US Granite Industry Master Artisans, would be the most fitting homage to Dr. King- not a project corrupted by a small group of self-serving mismanagers substantiating their actions behind selective sound bytes from Dr. King’s speeches.
They will only tell half truths at best. King Is Ours is simply telling the whole truth. That is why America- including the entire US Granite Industry, the CA NAACP, VT Congressional Delegation and more- and the World is joining us and still listening to us nearly one year later. Join us as well.
Getting to bid on only the leftovers is still wrong. If it couldn’t be done in America, we would have no complaint. It can and it must be done in America. Contact us at kingisours. com for more information. Sign our petition linked there. Contact your congressional reps and demand 100% US Granite and 100% US Labor.
It is time for even the executives of the MLK Foundation- not just their critics- to be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. They are deliberately destroying our history to their own selfish good fortune- just look at their tax returns at www. guidestar. com. Expenses, in comparison to tangible results, are staggering. They have also failed to admit/report that one of their touted African American Artists Consultants tendered his resignation over two months ago, yet they still represent in subsequent interviews that he is part of their efforts. They must be held accountable.
It would be of great service to all to have those vigorously critical of the critics turn that same fury against those people actually getting paid to do this wrong. We are the messengers, not the offenders.
Washington, DC is not in China yet. Until that day comes and the project absolutely cannot be produced here, our greatest memorials to freedom and civil rights do not need to be produced there or anywheres else. Such is what makes this America. It is our history first.
Join us. Do what it right before it is too late- what can you do to make a difference?
King Is Ours.
Clint Button
King Is Ours- US Granite Industry Liaison
www. kingisours. com
January 7th, 2008 at 12:27 am
One correction to above post- “non-white, portfolio qualified Master Sculptors” should say “non-black”. There are no black carvers or sculptors left in the US Granite Industry or art community in general.
Also- Maya Lin (Vietnam Memorial design-winning artist) was/is a native born US citizen of Asian descent. If Lei had been an American citizen or born here, our protest would be moot and racist- as were claims against Maya Lin who was chosen via a fair and open RFP (Request For Proposals) process.
Clint Button