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中国的沉默长城: 评高强「毛泽东勇渡江」。
This Warhol-esque work stands alone below as observers would have seen it in 2006 in Beijing's main art district. It shows Mao Zedong swimming in water colored bright red by the artist, the water staining Mao’s face. This painting is world famous, but not as well known in China. The authorities removed it shortly after it was first exhibited.
这幅安迪沃荷式的作品曾短暂现身于2006年北京的艺术特区。画中表现出毛泽东在一片染红的水里游泳，同时水面上浮现著毛的倒影。这幅举世闻名的油画在中国却并不怎么知名，因為它在北京的展览初期即被有关单位取下。
The subject of Gao Qiang’s painting is a black-and-white photograph of Mao swimming in the Yangtze River on July 16, 1966. The photographs were published nationwide and electrified the country. Mao had not been as visible or as powerful in the earlier years of the decade. The photographs showed him still vigorous at age 72.
高强这幅画的主題源自于一张纪录毛泽东在1966年七月十六日泳渡长江的黑白照片。这张著名的照片在全中国广为流传。此时的毛虽不如早些年那样地具有权势，但照片中已经七十二岁的毛却依旧显得神采奕奕。
Within weeks of the publication of the photographs Mao began to retake total command of the country in a movement that became known as the “Cultural Revolution.” Three million people were to be killed.
在这张照片公开流传之后的数星期，毛为了重新夺权，发动了著名的「文化大革命」，造成三百万人受迫害而死亡。
The Cultural Revolution is the defining moment in the political history of the People’s Republic of China. When it ended with Mao’s death the new authorities immediately reversed it. Despite it’s centrality, the Cultural Revolution is a taboo subject today. It and it’s disasters are too closely associated with the basis of the state’s legitimacy, that is, with Mao Zedong.
文化大革命是中华人民共和国政治历程的一项重要政治运動。当毛去逝后，新的领导班子立即停止了大革命。虽然这个运动影响如此深远，但直至今日，文化大革命依旧被视为一项政治禁忌，这是因為运动本身的发动和它所导致的灾难，都和这个国家的精神象征-毛泽东-脱不了干系。
This summer, as China hosts the world, China’s leaders want the world, and the Chinese people, to forget the Cultural Revolution. They want the world and the Chinese people to pay homage to Mao, to his portrait at the entrance to the Forbidden City, to his mausoleum across the street in Tiananmen Square, but to forget that it was he who was responsible for the Cultural Revolution.
今年夏天，当中国主办奥运会时，中国的领导当局希望世界各国和中国人民把文化大革命置诸脑后。他们希望世界各国和中国人民能对毛泽东，毛在紫禁城门入口的巨幅图像，以及天安门广场的毛纪念馆致以敬意，却刻意不提毛正是文化大革命元凶的事实。
The Gao brothers will have none of this brain-washing. They will not forget, and will not let others forget. Every Chinese knows what that photograph symbolizes. They know that even in black and white, the photograph has color, that Mao Zedong swims in a river of blood, and the stains upon his face are the blood of the Chinese people.
高氏兄弟却不会被这些宣传所洗脑，他们不想忘记，也提醒其他人不要忘记。每一个中国人都能理解那张照片所蕴含的象征意义。人们知道即使照片本身是黑白的，但它的背景却是饱含血色的 - 毛泽东在一条血流成的河里游泳，而他脸上的水渍，正是其受迫害的中国人民的斑斑鲜血。
作者: 班杰明•哈里斯
