London Chinatown lantern festival art project deemed distasteful

A public art project launched in London's Chinatown last night to celebrate the lantern festival has drawn controversy over a line of poetry that some Cantonese speakers described as vulgar.

Hong Kong-born artist Suki Chan was forced to alter the wording of a poem projected onto a wall.

Chan's illumination, The Story of Rice, came under fire from Chinese community leaders who thought that part of the wording of the projection could be translated into a crude term for defecation.

'There was one word in it which somebody took offence to,' said Chan, who moved to Britain when she was six. 'It was a stakeholder in Chinatown. He felt that it could sound like diarrhoea. I've asked other Cantonese speakers about it. They weren't sure it could be read in that way.'

Leslie Ng, part-owner of a restaurant and a member of the London Chinatown Chinese Association, said: 'We were a bit concerned about the content.'

But he said Westminster City Council listened to the group's concerns and reconsidered it.

'They didn't want to intervene with the artist's idea but then I said 'the artist's idea is the artist's idea but something is not appropriate',' Mr Ng said.

Ms Chan's art installation involves poems submitted by Chinese people from Britain and around the world, including the one at issue, which had originally read Chi bao mi, la bao mi. But some Cantonese speakers, took offence. Members of the Chinese association took part in a heated e-mail discussion.

'The literal translation of part of the 'poem' to be projected onto the Lisle Street walls include 'Eat Sweet Corns S**t Sweet Corns, Eat Sweet Potatoes S**t Sweet Potatoes',' one member wrote. Bowing to pressure, Ms Chan changed the poem to read Chi bao mi, ba bao mi, though she said she is still upset she had to change it.

The public art project is part of a plan by the Westminster City Council to rejuvenate the Chinatown and the city's west end in the aftermath of the terrorist suicide bombings in July.

A second project, by an artist named Ying Shen, is more innocuous and involves projecting pictures of Chinese themes on the wall of a fire station. Both projects will run for six months.

The original poem is projected on a wall, left, and after the change.