A suspicious fire at Liberty Sculpture Park that apparently took place earlier today or late yesterday destroyed Weiming Chen’s latest artwork and political statement, CCP Virus.
In existence since 2017, Liberty Sculpture Park in Yermo, some 11 miles east of Barstow and visible from the northeast bound lanes south of the I-15 Freeway, is home to artwork by Chen, who characterizes himself as equal parts sculptor and freedom activist. The works Chen has established in the 36-acre compound in the Mojave Desert are intended to celebrate the human spirit in its longing for freedom in the face of the oppression of tyranny, which in the modern world, according to Chen, is represented by communism.
Chen was born in Hangzhou, China in 1970 and now resides in both New Zealand and the United States. On June 4 he unveiled CCP Virus [i.e., Chinese Communist Party Virus] and his other latest work, titled Victims of Communism. They joined other Chen pieces, including a bust of Chief Crazy Horse, the inside of the headdress for which bears the phrase, “Give me liberty or give me death”; a statue of Chinese activist Li Wangyang; Tank Man, which shows the still-unidentified man with two shopping bags who stood down a tank on June 5, 1989 during protests that took place in Tiniananmen Square that year; 64, which commemorates the Tiniananmen Square protests, which, according to unverified reports contradicted by the Chinese Communist Government, ended in the massacre of somewhere between 200 and 2,000 protesters; and the work Liberate Hong Kong.
Until it was destroyed, CCP Virus was a three dimensional depiction of a coronavirus cell melded into the head of a man’s head/skeleton. The intended statement was that COVID-19 is the product of a military/governmental lab in Wuhan, China. Such suggestions, even in the United States, were formerly dismissed as anti-Chinese propaganda, but the scientific community more recently has partially credited that account, suggesting the COVID-19 virus involved genetic manipulations of a naturally occurring virus. Experts are divided on the purpose of the alterations with most saying they were done to advance legitimate research on how to combat the disease, while a minority believe there may have been a darker, more sinister intent at play.
The Sentinel was notified of what had occurred just prior to press time, and has been unable to determine if the destruction of Weiming Chen’s political statement was a misguided effort at a countervailing political statement.
The other sculptures at the park remain intact.