{"id":76881,"date":"2026-03-31T13:07:23","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:07:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/31\/dissident-artist-gao-zhen-tried-china-satirical-mao-sculptures-rights-group"},"modified":"2026-03-31T20:45:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T11:45:37","slug":"us-based-dissident-artist-put-on-trial-in-china-over-satirical-mao-sculptures-says-rights-group","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=76881","title":{"rendered":"US-based dissident artist put on trial in China over satirical Mao sculptures, says rights group"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>New York-based Gao Zhen was detained in 2024 during a family visit to China and then tried for \u2018defaming national heroes\u2019  <\/p>\n<p>The Chinese dissident artist <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/article\/2024\/sep\/03\/gao-zhen-artist-known-for-work-critiquing-cultural-revolution-arrested-in-china\">Gao Zhen<\/a>, known for making satirical sculptures of China\u2019s former leader Mao Zedong, has been tried over accusations of \u201cdefaming national heroes and martyrs\u201d, his wife and a rights group have said.<\/p>\n<p>Gao, 69, who was detained in 2024 during a visit to China from the US, faces a maximum three-year prison sentence, his wife, Zhao Yaliang, and Shane Yi, a researcher at the Chinese human rights defenders group, said.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/31\/dissident-artist-gao-zhen-tried-china-satirical-mao-sculptures-rights-group\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New York-based Gao Zhen was detained in 2024 during a family visit to China and then tried for \u2018defaming national heroes\u2019  The Chinese dissident artist Gao Zhen, known for making satirical sculptures of China\u2019s former leader Mao Zedong, has been tried &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[91,41,50,71,53,695,1065,47,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-and-design","category-asia-pacific","category-china","category-culture","category-human-rights","category-mao-zedong","category-sculpture","category-us-news","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76881"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76884,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76881\/revisions\/76884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}