Self-taught Mao painter stays clear of politics for art's sake

WHILE Ge Xiaoguang may not be a household name, almost every Chinese has seen his masterpiece - the giant portrait of Mao Zedong hanging over Tiananmen Square.

As far as the 40-year-old Mao painter is concerned, his rendition of the Great Helmsman is purely an ''artistic expression'' and it has little to do with propaganda or politics.

In the past two decades, Ge has done portraits of almost every ''holy father'' of the socialist movement including Marx, Lenin and Stalin. Even the portrait of the national father, Dr Sun Yat-sen, which was often displayed at Tiananmen Square on nationaldays, was his work.

In the era of the socialist market economy, however, only one of his works, the Mao painting, is still displayed prominently.

Ge said he used to paint at least one Mao portrait every year and each took about two weeks to complete.

Despite their size, he never shared his work with others and even his studio was a ''restricted area''.

The self-taught artist first took up his brush in 1971 when he joined a team of painters to work on ''revolutionary'' portraits for government buildings in Beijing.