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October 31 Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Liu Laibin Dies After Enduring Five Years of Imprisonment in China
Name: Liu Laibin (刘来彬) (Clearwisdom.net) (By a correspondent from Liaoning Province) Mr. Liu Laibin used to have a stomach disorder, phlebitis, and lung disease. He began practicing Falun Dafa in 1997, and all his illnesses disappeared. He disciplined himself according to the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and treated others kindly.
After the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) started persecuting Falun Gong in July 1999, the local police and community workers constantly harassed him when he went home, and they arrested him and once sent him to a brainwashing center.
On June 24, 2003, Mr. Liu was doing business in front of the Jianfeng Market in Zhanqian District, Yingkou City. Several officers from the Desheng Police Station arrested and detained him in the Yingkou City Detention Center, where he was brutally beaten by other prisoners. Guard Yi Zhaoyun would not allow Mr. Liu to do the exercises or speak. He forced Mr. Liu to do more than 10 hours of labor, and he often had to work overtime and into the night. He had very little sleep, and prisoners were forced to be on night watch duty where they would take turns watching his cell.
During his detention, the Zhanqian District Procuratorate charged Mr. Liu with "crimes undermining the execution of the law". They put Mr. Liu on trial on December 5, 2003, and sentenced him to five years in prison on December 23, 2003. He was taken to Yingkou City Prison in February 2004.
Upon entering Yingkou City Prison, guards instructed prisoners to force Mr. Liu to write statements to accept the brainwashing. He was once locked in a small cell (1) for four days, forced to sit on a small stool that was only one inch wide, and deprived of sleep for 24 hours. Mr. Liu's life was in danger twice, but the prison refused to release him. He was finally released after his five year term ended in June 2008. He died at around 9:00 a.m. on October 10, 2009.
(1) The detainee is locked up in a very small cell individually. The guards handcuff practitioners behind the back in a fixed position, in which the practitioners can neither move nor lie down. The small cell is very damp and no sunshine comes in. Detainees have to urinate and defecate in the cell. Only half of a regular meal is served to detainees locked up in a small cell during the daytime. During the night the rats run around. The stench in the small cell is so bad that it is difficult to breathe. October 30 Revealed: The breakfast cereals saltier than crisps and with more sugar than a doughnut
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Simple is better.
This could be 2010's most powerful marketing mantra. If 2009's hottest sales pitch was all about buying stuff on the cheap, 2010 marketing will increasingly stress less as more, as in fewer parts, additives or ingredients. While the trend is taking hold in many product categories, including health and beauty items, nowhere is it more apparent than with things we eat and drink. This may be more marketing magic than reality. How can a product made by Kraft, Campbell's or Dreyer's be made to sound as simply healthy as something made fresh in your kitchen? "One way to spin this is talk about how few ingredients your product contains," says Tom Vierhile, product analyst at researcher Datamonitor. Companies that offer products with the fewest number of ingredients compared with rivals stand to win big in 2010, says Lynn Dornblaser, trends guru at Mintel. Mintel has tracked decreases this year in the average number of ingredients in 19 product categories including dairy products, processed meats and even pet foods. Consumers these days not only want to know what's in the stuff they eat and drink — they want to know what's not. In a nation bedeviled by a whirlwind of food scares and mounting worries about the healthiness of a plethora of things commonly used in processed foods, folks increasingly are demanding cleaner food labels: no artificial food colorings (some of which have been linked to hyperactivity in children), no chemical additives (such as MSG) and no chemical preservatives (such as BHA). If they can't pronounce it, consumers don't want it. The new marketing code word being used to boast about fewer ingredients: simple. From 2005 to 2008, there's been a 64.7% increase in new products using the words "simple" or "simply" in the product or brand name, reports researcher Datamonitor. In 2010, products that tout simplified labels will be more sought after than those clinging to the formerly hot buzzwords "organic" or "natural," says Dornblaser. At its simplest, simple sells. "The food business has always been ingenious at turning any criticism into a new way to sell food to us," says Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. The best-selling book popularized the notion of buying only foods with five or fewer ingredients. "As soon as you stress fewer ingredients, you're implying that the food is healthy." New York University nutrition professor Marion Nestle has long-advised folks to eat mostly minimally processed food: items with ingredients as close to raw — and in their natural state — as is safe. Typically, that also means fewer ingredients. "Any trend towards less processing is good," she says. But fewer ingredients in high-sugar, high-salt or high-fat items such as ice cream, cookies or chips isn't what she had in mind. When it comes to healthy eating, she is talking about five ingredients in a loaf of bread — not a box of cookies. Simplifying such snack foods "is savvy marketing that consumers are buying right into," Nestle says. Perhaps that's why Häagen-Dazs launched an ice cream line this year dubbed and marketed as simply Five for its five ingredients — milk, cream, sugar, eggs and one natural flavor, such as mint. Also this summer, Starbucks rejiggered its entire food menu primarily with an eye toward simplifying the items' ingredients. Beech-Nut touts "No Junk" on its new Let's Grow line of toddler foods. From the marketers' kitchen Few are talking louder about simplifying ingredients than Häagen-Dazs. But its red-hot Five ice cream line did not come from a breakthrough in its new product lab. Five was born in the marketing department of parent company Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream. Early in 2008, Ching-Yee Hu, a self-proclaimed foodie and brand manager at the company, observed a consumer focus group meeting that convinced her it was time for Häagen-Dazs to create a line with an absolute minimum of ingredients. At the gathering in San Francisco, one of Häagen-Dazs' strongest markets, a panelist mentioned that when he shopped recently, he found himself comparing a bag of potato chips that had 20 ingredients with a bag that had three. He said the bag with the short list was the obvious choice. "As he told this story, I could see all the other consumers in the room nodding their heads in agreement. And I wondered: Why can't we bring ice cream down to the bare minimum?" Hu recalls. Lots of names were considered for the line, including Simple and Simply Häagen-Dazs. "But if you use the word 'simple,' what does that really mean?" asks Hu. By naming the line Five, "We're forcing ourselves to be true to who we are." The line rolled out in March with seven flavors. The marketing campaign included an online chat asking folks about the five most essential things they want to do in their lives. The response was so strong that it crashed the servers at Dreyer's within two hours. Häagen-Dazs also opted to list the ingredients on the front of the package. Although executives won't detail sales, the line already accounts for 10% of the brand's business, says Gulbin Hoeberechts, brand director. The "repeat rates" of first-time buyers coming back to buy the Five line are exceeding the industry average by 30%. Executives are considering extending the Five line with other sizes and other forms of ice cream. That suits Joel Vancil, an alarm-monitoring technician from Seattle. Vancil is a big fan of Five. "If you're going to eat ice cream, it might as well not contain all the junk that's usually in ice cream," he says. Vancil and his girlfriend have plowed through about 10 pints of Five's mint flavor since spring. "We have to contain ourselves not to buy more," he says. Among other familiar food names adding to the trend: •Starbucks. Five years ago, consumers started asking Starbucks for healthier foods, says Sarah Osmer, director of health and wellness at the chain. Last year, the company began to study in the food lab how to improve quality. Its banana bread, for example, had been made with 15 ingredients. But food scientists have slimmed that to 10. One way: Stop using banana flavoring. "We can just put more bananas in and do the same job," Osmer says. When the revamped food line was rolled out earlier this year, baristas handed out samples of the new banana bread along with index cards listing the ingredients. "It's so real, you'd want to make it at home," Osmer says. This same thinking was applied last year to a Starbucks beverage. Vivanno, the fruit smoothie line, now comes with four ingredients: milk, juice, banana and natural protein fiber powder. As Häagen-Dazs did for Five, ads for Vivanno listed the ingredients. "In the past it had always been about romancing. Now it's about us telling you exactly what's in it," Osmer says. •Kraft. At the nation's largest processed-food maker, many products have lots of ingredients. But its Triscuit cracker brand has embraced the less-is-more trend. What's in the box: wheat, salt and oil. This year, it began replacing palm oil with healthier soybean oil. And Triscuit marketing and labeling spell out the specific whole-grain wheat: soft white winter wheat. "Consumers want all the details you can provide on ingredients," says Jim Low, marketing director at Kraft Foods. "They want us to be more transparent." Even the package design has been simplified in earth-tone colors. Something's working. Triscuit had a double-digit sales increase in the second quarter of 2009. At the same time, the Back to Nature line that Kraft acquired in 2003 continues to limit the ingredients in products. Its Triple Ginger cookie due in January will be about as simple as it can be: whole-grain wheat, cane juice, crystallized ginger, ground ginger and ginger extract. That's it. "The more specific and less airy we are about ingredients in our food, the more people respond," says Dan Anglemyer, the line's senior brand manager. •Campbell. Campbell's most popular soup, Chicken Noodle, has a lengthy ingredient list with items such as monosodium glutamate (MSG) and sodium phosphates. But its Select Harvest line limits the number of ingredients — and spells out what each one is. Campbell spoke with hundreds of Select Harvest's key customers — women over age 35 — and found "they want more transparency and simplicity in the foods they eat," says Sean Connolly, president at Campbell USA. For example, maltodextrin is found in soups in both its Chunky and Select Harvest lines. For Select Harvest, Campbell provides a simple description of what it is: a carbohydrate from potato or corn starch. It provides no such explanation on Chunky soups. Also, caramel color is used in some Campbell's soups but not in Select Harvest, because the line does not use artificial colorings. •Beech-Nut. When Beech-Nut rolled out the Let's Grow toddler foods late last year, it put a "No Junk" promise on the container and in its marketing. That means no added sugars, modified starches or fillers, says Dennis Warner, vice president of marketing. "We don't put in any ingredients that moms might not know what they mean," he says. Simple for Fido, too Even pets aren't immune. Natura Pet Products makes four premium pet-food lines. Its California Natural dog and cat foods have the shortest ingredient list of any pet food on the market, claims President Don Scott. For example, its Lamb Meal & Rice dry dog food lists just nine ingredients. By comparison, many dry dog foods include food colorings, artificial preservatives and corn gluten meal as a filler. California Natural, whose tagline is "pure and simple," is priced at about $40 for a 30-pound bag. Since simplifying the packaging last year — and stressing the short ingredient list — California Natural has become the company's fastest-growing line. "It's surprised us," says Scott. "And not a lot surprises us here." | |||||||||||
Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Guo Huisheng Dies as a Result of Persecution in China
Name: Guo Huisheng (郭会生 ) (Clearwisdom.net) Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Guo Huisheng was an employee of the Legal System Office in Jiahe County, Hunan Province. His wife Ms. Li Jumei works at the Zhuquanwan Elementary School. They wrote a letter to Xi Xiaogang, Director of the Lanshan County Police Department, to request the release of fellow practitioner Ms. Xiao Silan. As a result, they suffered brutal persecution from the local 610 Office and National Security Bureau. On the night of August 6, 2009, they were arrested by a group of police officers. Their home was searched twice when no one was home. Mr. Guo's hands were handcuffed behind his back, and he was held to the ground and beaten by Hu Yonghui, political head of the local National Security Bureau, and three other police officers. When he was brought to the police station, there was blood all over his head and face.
On October 6, 2009, he fell into a coma in the detention center, and was taken to the People's Hospital in Jiahe County for emergency treatment. After brain surgery, he remained in a coma. He had a faint heartbeat, but remained unconscious.
It was confirmed that he passed away at 5:00 a.m. on October 12, 2009 in the hospital. His wife is still being detained.
Gender: Male
Age: Unknown
Address: Unknown
Occupation: Employee of the Legal System Office in Jiahe County, Hunan Province
Date of Death: October 12, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 6, 2009
Most Recent Place of Detention: Local detention center
City: Jiahe County
Province: Hunan Province
Persecution Suffered: Beatings, Home Ransacked, Detention
Mobile Use Linked to Brain Tumours
By Daily Express reporter
LONG-term mobile phone users could face a higher risk of developing cancer in later life, according to a decade-long study.
The report, to be published later this year, has reportedly found that heavy mobile use is linked to brain tumours.
The survey of 12,800 people in 13 countries has been overseen by the World Health Organisation.
Preliminary results of the inquiry, which is looking at whether mobile phone exposure is linked to three types of brain tumour and a tumour of the salivary gland, have been sent to a scientific journal.
The findings are expected to put pressure on the British Government – which has insisted that mobile phones are safe – to issue stronger warnings to users.
Falun Gong Practitioner, Ms. Jin Yingdan Died as Result of the Persecution in China
Name: Jin Yingdan (金英丹) (Clearwisdom.net) (By a correspondent from Jilin Province) Ms. Jin Yingdan was of Korean ethnicity. She had many sicknesses before cultivating Falun Dafa. She became healthy and kind after becoming a practitioner. She was a cheerful employee, selling clothes in a privately owned fashion store
In April 2009, officers from Longmen Street Police Station and Longjing City Police Department stormed into her work place. They took her Dafa books and bills with truth clarifying words on them. They arrested Ms. Jin and tortured her when she was in custody at the police compound. They deprived her of food and sleep. Later, they took her to the Longjing City Detention Center.
On the fifth day, Ms. Jin's condition was critical. The doctors said she could die at any time and persuaded the police to release her. Ms. Jin could not rest much at home because the police often came to her door to harass her. She suffered from tremendous mental pressure and died on October 5, 2009.
Gender: Female
Age: 50
Address: Longjing City, Yanbina Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Jilin Province
Occupation: Retail clothing sales
Date of Death: October 5, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: April 2009
Most Recent Place of Detention: Longjing City Detention Center (龙井看守所)
City: Longjing
Province: Jilin
Persecution Suffered: Sleep Deprivation, Torture, Home Ransacked, Interrogation, Detention
When a Mexican rubbish dump becomes a garden of Eden
Many acres in Mexico City that were previously piled high with filth have become lush vegetable gardens tended by the locals.
A low-budget scheme has transformed a rubbish dump in an impoverished part of Mexico City into an urban garden, raising hopes for a new shade of green revolution.
Iztapalapa, a bustling borough of two million people within the greater sprawl of Mexico City's 20 million people, is an unlikely place to find an agricultural revolution.
But on a patch of land once strewn with the detritus associated with one of the world's largest cities, there now sits a 400 square metre (4,305 square feet) garden.
It is maintained by 40-year-old Irma Diaz as part of the district council's "agricultural development" program.
"We started in 2007 with 20 projects, we now have 82," said Edgar Duran, coordinator of the scheme, which has invested just 131,000 pesos, or around $10,000, and relies largely on volunteers to farm mini-plots where they are available.
In Iztapalapa fruit and vegetables are grown in mini-gardens, on roofs and even on the walls of buildings. The natural produce is in demand from the many chic restaurants that dot the capital.
"We grow tomatoes and dozens of vegetables: lettuce, beets, carrots, radishes, and all without fertilizers or pesticides," said Diaz, a nurse who entered the scheme with some friends.
"Everything is natural, 'bio', as they say. It is for our use, but we sell a little," she said.
Susana Duran, a project coordinator for Iztapalapa, explained the transformation of a shady area of the capital. "Here people were throwing their garbage, young people were using drugs," she said.
Juanita Galeana, 60, comes to work in the garden twice a week with her husband. They sell a portion of production with Diaz on Wednesdays and Fridays. "I lived in the country until I was 16. Like any kid, I planted seeds and I loved to harvest with my father," she said.
Now, she said, she sometimes sells the produce for a nominal sum of around 80 pesos (six dollars).
Eugenio Varga is at the plot every morning. He is responsible for watering, which he takes care to ration because supply is frequently cut.
"It distracted me," the 75 year-old said. "I am a widower, I live with my nephews. I take a few vegetables at home, they are tasty, fresh," he said.
Today, with Irma and Juanita, he is preparing a succulent salad of beets and tomatoes.
When the two women want to sell something they go to regular clients, who appreciate the freshness of the products and a slightly lower price than in the market.
"More than money, it's satisfying to take home good quality food, or when our customers tell us they had only seen carrots with their green stalks, as we sell them, in drawings," Irma Diaz said smiling.
She has one regret though, young people show little interest in the project, including her own son. It may not be a agricultural revolution just yet.
85-Year-Old Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Zhang Liyun Dies As a Result of Persecution in China
Name: Zhang Liyun (张理郧) (Clearwisdom.net) Mr. Zhang Liyun, 85, had been a Falun Gong practitioner for more than ten years and always forged ahead diligently. After the Chinese Communist Party began to persecute Falun Gong, he overcame the inconvenience of old age and often distributed Falun Gong fliers and clarified the facts about Falun Gong.
Around 11 a.m. on June 18, 2009, while he was promoting Falun Gong around the Shuanghulu Community, he was arrested by eight officers from the Huixing Police Station. He kept explaining about the persecution of Falun Gong to the officers, and at 6 p.m. on the same day, he was released. Only after he returned home did he learn that the police had searched his home and seized portraits of the founder of Falun Dafa, Dafa books and materials, his ID card, a cellphone, and other items.
Several days later, he went to the police station to demand the return of his cell phone, but the officers railed at him. About a month later, without going through any legal proceedings, the police station officials issued a sentence of "one year of forced labor to be served outside the labor camp under surveillance."
Due to persecution by the CCP, this 85-year-old man's health became worse and worse. He developed bladder stones and went into renal failure. Medical treatment was ineffective. He passed away on September 26, 2009.
Gender: Male
Age: 85
Address: Shuanghulu Community, Huixing Street, Yubei District, Chongqing City
Occupation: Unknown
Date of Death: September 26, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: June 18, 2009
Most recent place of detention: Huixing Police Station (回兴派出所)
City: Chongqing
Persecution Suffered: Home Ransacked, Detention
Paul Peel
Paul Peel
Biography by David Wistow.
http://www.arthistoryarchive.com
B. 7 Nov. 1860 in London, Upper Canada, son of John Robert Peel and Amelia Margaret Hall; m. 16 Jan. 1886 Isaure Fanchette Verdier in Willesden (London), England, and they had one son and one daughter; d. 3 Oct. 1892 in Paris.
In the early 1850s Paul Peel’s parents, both of whom were born in England, settled in London, Upper Canada, where his father quickly prospered as a stone-carver and drawing instructor. The eight Peel children were provided with a supportive and artistic family milieu; Paul and his sister Mildred especially flourished under their father’s tutelage. In 1875 Paul became a pupil of the English-born landscape and portrait painter William Lees Judson, who instructed him in the rudiments of the predominant style of the day, called academic art, and encouraged him to paint outdoors. One of Peel’s works dating from his two years under Judson won a prize at London’s Western Fair in September 1876.
The Painter-1880
The following summer Peel was accepted into the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, in Philadelphia, where he studied with Christian Schussele and the more progressive Thomas Eakins. Training consisted not only of drawing from engravings, plaster casts, and the live model, but also included the study of portraiture, still-life, perspective, and anatomy. Eakins instilled in the young artist a desire to explore the visual world intensely and to render it accurately using a new, direct method of painting which involved “drawing” immediately with the brush and coloured pigments. By April 1880 Peel was back home, greatly enriched.
Devotion. 1881
Three prizes received at the Western Fair of 1880, as well as several sales, reflect the artist’s growing local reputation, although his paintings to this point – primarily genre scenes and landscapes - remained stilted and unresolved. In early October Peel was elected to membership in the Ontario Society of Artists [see John Arthur Fraser], and by the end of the month had departed for Europe, possibly stopping in London where he may have attended classes at the Royal Academy of Arts. Peel spent much of the next dozen years in Paris, attracted by its superior art schools and opportunities for exhibiting. In this regard he typifies the second wave of Canadian artists who studied and worked in France, including William Brymner*, George Agnew Reid*, and Robert Harris*.
Covent Garden Market, London, ON. 1883
The spring and summer of 1881 were passed at Pont-Aven, Brittany, a village especially favoured by Americans for its picturesque setting and the traditional life-style of its inhabitants. By June, Peel had already sent four paintings on Breton themes to his father, who had them included in the second annual exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts [see John Douglas Sutherland Campbell*; Lucius Richard O’Brien], held in Halifax, and the Industrial Exhibition, Toronto. That fall Peel settled in Paris near the bohemian quarter of Montparnasse and began working on the first of his many large-scale genre paintings, The spinner. Its carefully planned yet confident verisimilitude marks a significant stage in the artist’s development.
Return of the Flock. 1883
In April 1882 it was exhibited in Montreal by the RCA; in addition to furthering his reputation at home it was influential in securing his election that month as an associate of the academy. Also in April, in Paris, he began to study under Jean-Léon Gérôme, a leading exponent of the academic style, in his studio located in the École des Beaux-Arts, although contrary to tradition Peel was never officially enrolled at the École. Gérôme, not coincidentally, had taught Eakins, Peel’s teacher in Philadelphia. Peel’s large painting La première notion on the theme of mother and child, was accepted for inclusion in the 1883 Salon of the Société des Artistes Français, a remarkable achievement for a 22-year-old.
Peel spent the summer and fall of 1883 in London, Ont., where he completed several portraits and landscapes including the accomplished Covent Garden Market, London, Ontario. He exhibited works at the Industrial Exhibition and the Western Fair, winning no fewer than seven first prizes at the latter. On 13 December he and Mildred left for Paris and passed the following summer in Pont-Aven. The presence there of Jules Bastien-Lepage, a proponent of the juste milieu, a compromise between the academic style and Impressionism, encouraged Peel to paint more broadly and with a sunnier palette.
The Spinner- 1888
He also met at Pont-Aven the Danish-born painter Isaure Fanchette Verdier, who became his wife on 16 Jan. 1886. In the spring they visited Isaure’s family in Copenhagen, where the following year Peel’s mother-in-law sold one of his paintings (Two friends, 1886) to Alexandra, Princess of Wales, while she was on a visit to her native city. After a trip to London, England, in May 1886 to view the Colonial and Indian Exhibition, where Peel had seven works displayed, the couple returned to Paris. Their first child, Robert André, was born there on 22 October. Émilie Marguerite was to follow on 15 Nov. 1888.
The Discovery of Moses- 1888-92
Peel exhibited a pastel in each of the Salons of 1887 and 1888 (both works are now lost), and continued his formal training. Beginning in 1887 he spent four years studying with Benjamin Constant, who influenced his awakening interest in exotic, foreign subjects. When Constant was hired in the fall of 1888 to teach at the Académie Julian, Peel followed him there and brought along his new Canadian friend, the recently arrived George Agnew Reid. They found a large, friendly coterie of young artists, including several other Canadians. Peel’s work from 1888 and 1889 demonstrates an assurance and sophistication not previously evident, especially in his painting of a new subject, the nude. His entries in the Salon of 1889, The Venetian bather and The modest model (the latter won an honourable mention) are attractively conceived and competently executed, particularly in the modelling of the human form.
The Modest Model- 1889
Works by Peel were also included in Canadian exhibitions held in 1889: the RCA (Ottawa), the Art Association of Montreal, the OSA (Toronto), and the Industrial Exhibition. His growing reputation at home was acknowledged by his election on 26 April 1890 to full membership in the RCA. Peel’s greatest achievement, however, was the third-class medal he received from that year’s Salon for the impressive After the bath. Like several of his works, it evolved from a carefully composed photograph; this practice was recommended by Gérôme but Peel’s use of it has not yet been fully assessed. In part owing to favourable reviews, which were immediately forthcoming, several collectors, among them the actress Sarah Bernhardt, were attracted to this large painting. It finally sold in 1891 to the Hungarian government and today hangs in the Art Gallery of Ontario.
After the Bath- 1890
In July 1890 Peel made a trip home to see his dying mother. He did some oil sketching around southern Ontario and at Quebec in a light-filled Impressionist mode, and organized an exhibition of 32 of his works at London’s Tecumseh House Hotel towards the end of September. More important, he held an auction of 57 works in Toronto in mid October, a sale which realized $2,746. Although contemporaries generally felt that the paintings had sold for less than their true value, scholars continue to disagree about whether this amount constituted an adequate reward for Peel’s efforts, and no comment from the artist himself has survived. In November he left for France.
The Young Botanist- 1888-90
The next two years witnessed a further consolidation of Peel’s art and reputation. He spent the summers with his family in Denmark and continued to exhibit at the Salon (La jeunesse in 1891 and Les jumelles in 1892) as well as in Toronto. In late September 1892 he suddenly fell ill in Paris and died on 3 October, possibly of influenza.
Portrait of Gloria Roberts- 1889
Although Peel left a substantial body of work, he must be seen as a talented painter at the threshold of achieving his full artistic maturity. Despite a certain unevenness often found in the work of young artists, Peel’s creative output made him, in his day, perhaps Canada’s best-known painter in Europe. His frequent displays of technical virtuosity, especially in the depiction of the human body, his adherence to the conservative tenets of the juste milieu, and his fascination with domestic scenes of women and children - always touching, occasionally erotic - perfectly reflect 19th-century European bourgeois values and the artistic concerns of most of his generation. Peel’s considerable popularity in Canada today rests on a few pictures in just such a mode. However sentimental, they continue to strike immediate chords.
The Little Shepardess - 1892
Lost Peel found?
Sat, July 4, 2009 (lfpress.com) London Free Press
By JONATHAN SHER
A long-lost painting, likely among the first done by Londoner Paul Peel, may have finally surfaced. One hundred and thirty-two years after it disappeared from public view, a painting believed to be among the first by London artist Paul Peel is making a grand return, its long absence the subject of mystery.
Peel was only 16 when in 1876 he displayed at the Western Fair a portrait of a St. Bernard dog, his work winning recognition as the best by an amateur. The painting was shown the following year at a local gallery but its fate since was a mystery until an unlikely find in a place best known for covered bridges, shoofly pie and the oldest Amish settlement in the United States, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. It was there, at an antiques shop in a village of 1,028 called Paradise that an art collector found a small unsigned painting with a typed label on its back that claimed it was the work of Peel.
The collector bought the portrait for $1,800 and phoned Museum London, but its curator, Ihor Holubizky, was skeptical. Much on the label was incorrect. The errors include the spelling of Peel's name and his age at his untimely demise in 1892. So the collector e-mailed photos, and the more Holubizky examined them, the more he became convinced the find was real. "All the signs were pointing to this being a Paul Peel," he said yesterday. The portrait of the top half of a St. Bernard matched a description of the work that appeared in a newspaper in 1876.
Though portraits of hunting dogs were common then, one of a St. Bernard was unheard of, Holubizky said. Even the location of its discovery seemed plausible, because soon after the exhibits Peel went to Philadelphia, 60 kilometres east of Paradise, to attend the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. The more Holubizky considered the evidence, the more excited he became. "Oh my God! This is the earliest known original subject painting of Paul Peel," he thought. Peel has a short but brilliant career, his full potential not realized because of his early death to an infection, Holubizky said.
There's more detective work to be done to establish the link between Peel and the painting of the St. Bernard:
-- Experts will examine the painting itself, particularly its frame and canvas.
-- Holubizky will try to find out how it ended up in an antique shop; the collector says the store bought it in an estate sale.
The painting, expected to arrive as soon as Monday, will centre a Peel exhibit that includes 25 paintings as well as sketches and sculptures, work by his father and by his first teacher. Museum officials hustled to arrange the exhibit because the American collector had a narrow window when the St. Bernard painting could be loaned. So with questions of its authenticity lingering, Londoners can do more than see the formative work of a great artist -- they'll be witness to a mystery. "It brings detective work into the public forum," Holubizky said. "We're letting the people in."
The typed label
A typed label was found on the back of the painting that misspelled Paul Peel's name and was mistaken about his age, when he created it, when he died and his placement at the Paris Salon:
"This painting is the production of Paul Peelle, the celebrated artist of London, Ontario, when he was only 12 years of age. It was painted from life and represents the head of his dog, Young Peelle carried off the first prize at the Paris Salon for the best painting exhibited at that time, in the early 90ties. He was a poor boy and educated by W. D. McGloghlon. Deputy Grand Master of the Masonic Fraternity of Canada into whose hands this painting passed. Peelle died when he was only 34 years of age, just when he had entered on a most successful career."
By JONATHAN SHER
Falun Gong practitioner, Ms. Yan Guangbi Dies as a Result of Persecution in China
Name: Yan Guangbi (严光碧) (Clearwisdom.net) (By a correspondent from Chongqing) Ms. Yan Guangbi was a Falun Gong practitioner in Chongqing. Her husband is a practitioner employed by the Chongqing City 18th Middle School, which includes both junior and senior high. They both firmly kept their faith after the persecution began on July 20, 1999, and were consequently arrested and detained many times. Ms. Yan was detained several times and was forced to go through brainwashing three times. She had to leave home for more than a year to avoid being arrested. Due to being brutally mistreated in brainwashing sessions in the Chongqing City Women's Forced Labor Camp, she lost sight in both eyes. Her husband, Mr. Chen Changjun, was sentenced to forced labor two different times. As a result of torture, he had to use crutches after he was released. On April 21, 2008, at 5:00 p.m., the police stormed into Ms. Yan's home, arrested her, and took her to a forced labor camp. She soon appeared to suffer uremia due to being brutally mistreated and was sent home. Blind in both eyes, she was closely watched at home.
On April 25, 2009, Ms. Yan went to Chengdu City with her husband to sit in on the trial of Mr. Chen's younger brother, Mr. Chen Changyuan, who was on trial for practicing Falun Gong. The next day, the 18th Middle School CCP secretary, Xiong Kerong, deceived their daughter, Chen Yan, into going to her parents' home and opening the door. When they found the couple was gone, they ordered Ms. Chen to call all her relatives to inquire about the couple's whereabouts.
When the couple arrived at the Chengdu City High-tech Zone Court on April 29, 2009, the CCP was waiting,and surrounded them. They did not allow them to sit in on the trial and detained them in the Appeal's Office. They escorted the couple back to Chongqing City immediately after the trial ended.
Ms. Yan was sentenced to forced labor again and taken to Chongqing Shabao Women's Forced Labor Camp. She was released for medical treatment and was then rushed to the hospital for emergency care. The police were still closely monitoring her when she was in the hospital. She died on the morning of October 3, 2009, in Chongqing 324 Hospital. Her husband is still being closely watched 24 hours a day at home.
Gender: Female
Age: In her 50s
Address: Family housing inside Chongqing City 18th Middle School
Occupation: Retired teacher employed by Mitingzi Elementary School in the Jiangbei District
Date of Death: October 3, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: April 29, 2009
Most Recent Place of Detention: Chongqing City Shabao Women Labor Camp (重庆市沙堡女子劳教所)
City: Chongqing
Persecution Suffered: Forced Labor, Beatings, Solitary Confinement, Torture, Home Ransacked, Interrogation, Detention
Population atlas shows world in a new light
Researchers from the University of Sheffield created the online atlas of 200 maps using distribution data to demonstrate population distribution and density.
The map of Britain is marked by a swollen mass in London and the south east, while Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Cornwall are drastically reduced in size.
The maps also show the true land mass underneath the modified images to illustrate how different the two are.
The new world guides also break with the 500-year tradition of conventional cartography, which shows compass directions as straight lines.
They were created as part of a Leverhulme Trust project to remap the world and extend the Worldmapper project.
Benjamin Hennig, a postgraduate researcher at the University's Department of Geography, was part of the team that created the maps using the gridded population of the world database of the Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project.
Mr Hennig said the new projections give an "interesting insight into different countries".
He added: "The map of Afghanistan, for example, shows a country dominated by Kabul and a few other urban centres.
"The UK on this new global projection is a tale of London and the other cities.
"The United States, on the other hand, has much more variety to its human geography, while the new projection of China shows a sea of humanity bubbled up into a thousand cities in the Eastern part of the country."
The maps can be viewed at www.worldmapper.org/countrycartograms .
Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Ge Lijun Dies as Direct Result of Three Forced Labor Terms in China
Name: Ge Lijun (葛利军) (Clearwisdom.net) (By a correspondent from Xinjiang) Mr. Ge Lijun was a college student, but he was dismissed from school due to his practice of Falun Gong. He had to move around to avoid being arrested. In the past ten years of persecution, Mr. Ge was sent to the Changji City Forced Labor Camp three times for a total of six years.
In 2000, Mr. Ge was arrested and sentenced to three years of forced labor. In January 2001, inside the Changji Labor Camp, Mr. Ge sat meditating, and he was tortured with electric baton shocks in his sensitive spots by wardens Zhang Yan and Gu Jianhai. The guards ordered prisoners to beat and insult practitioners and arranged two prisoners to closely watch each practitioner around the clock. The practitioners were forced to labor for up to 20 hours per day, while being cursed, slapped, and having their backs hit with bricks.
Soon after he was released, Mr. Ge was arrested again in Hutubi City in 2003 by State Security agents. He was sent to the Changji Labor Camp again with a two-year term in August 2003.
Between March and April 2007, Wang Mingyu, a person planted by the police, deceived Mr. Ge into going to the Urumqi City Train Station. Police officers from Manas City and Tianshan District State Security agents arrested Mr. Ge and took more than 10,000 yuan in cash and his MP3 player from him. They sent Mr. Ge to the Changji Labor Camp a third time with another two-year term.
In March 2009, Mr. Ge was finally released, but due to long time brutal mistreatment, his four limbs were so stiff that he could not stretch out his arms or open his hands. His family took him to many hospitals, but the hospital administrators refused to take him in because police and 610 Office agents ordered them to turn him away. Mr. Ge died in June 2009.
Gender: Male
Age: 33
Address: Unknown
Occupation: Unknown
Date of Death: June 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: Between March and April of 2007
Most Recent Place of Detention: Changji City Force Labor Camp (昌吉劳教所)
City: Changji
Province: Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
Persecution Suffered: Electric Shock, Sleep Deprivation, Forced Labor, Brainwashing, Beatings, Torture, Extortion, Dismissed from College, Interrogation, Detention
Why do we bother? Residents sort rubbish into boxes... then it's all dumped in together
http://www.dailymail.co.uk
By Kate Loveys
Many have long suspected their diligent recycling may not actually be worth the effort.
And these extraordinary pictures seem to back up their very fears.
Residents of this cul-de-sac had clearly taken the time to sort their glass, cans, plastic and paper recycling into separate boxes.
The scheme was brought in last summer when the council in Croydon, South London, introduced fortnightly collections.
Tipping point: The worker is shown to tip all three, sorted bins into one container before consigning it all to landfill
So residents were understandably furious when a binman tipped the recycling box contents into a wheelie bin which was then dumped into the back of a dustcart.
And to add insult to injury, the vehicle boasted a sign stating: 'My next stop is landfill! Think before you throw.'
The shocking sequence was caught on camera by Darren Bagshaw, 37, who claims the binmen have carried out the same routine for the past three months.
Mr Bagshaw said: 'Regardless of their excuses we are still forced to make sure that we separate our rubbish.
"It takes a lot of time and it makes me really mad to think that it's pointless.
'Why on earth should we bother to do it when they just lump it all together again?
'It stinks of hypocrisy just like our bins stink in the summer because the council insists on fortnightly collections.'
Mr Bagshaw, a photographer, and his photography student girlfriend Charlotte Shaw, used to have their rubbish collected by a lorry with separate compartments for different waste and recycling.
They initially assumed the new system was a one-off but complained after it went on for months.
Last night Doretta Cocks, from the Campaign for Weekly Waste Collection, insisted: 'At the very least the council is setting a bad example.
'It has imposed fortnightly collections but it clearly can't properly deal with them, whilst expecting householders to abide by their rules for no apparent reason.'
Committed: A council worker empties bottles at a recycling centre. The Government has pledged to recycle 40 per cent of household waste by 2011
And shadow local government minister Bob Neill said: 'Across the country there is evidence that recycling collections are going in landfill.
'This must be tackled otherwise it will undermine public confidence.'
Croydon Council contracts Veolia Environnement to collect waste and recycling.
Malcolm Kendall, head of recycling and waste management at the council, admitted the signage on the lorry was misleading.
However he claimed its contents did not end up in a landfill, but were separated again at a recycling centre.
He said the binmen had swapped to a smaller lorry without separate compartments after problems with traffic and parked cars in Mr Bagshaw's cul-de-sac.
The smaller lorries were solely used for domestic waste until three months ago. Two of them are now used to collect recyclables from around 50 narrow roads in the area.
Mr Kendall said: 'Veolia has a outlet for a guaranteed small amount of this type of mixed recycling and we can assure residents that all their dry recyclables are sent to a recycling processing facility.'
Earlier this week, the council wrote to local residents seeking to assure them that their recycling did not end up on a landfill.
The letter states: 'I have now arranged for the landfill signage to be removed from both of the narrow access vehicles used by Veolia so as to avoid any further confusion to yourselves or other residents elsewhere.'
Councils across Britain are committed to recycling 40 per cent of household waste by 2011.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1216162/Why-bother-Residents-sort-rubbish-boxes--dumped-together.html#ixzz0UIls0FMs
Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Yu Yong Dies as a Result of Persecution in China
Gender: Male
Age: 38 (born in November 1971)
Address: 14 Jiaoyu Street, Nantuoling Village, Muyun Town, Changsha County, Hunan Province - Had resident permit in Tianxin District, Changsha City
Occupation: Self-employed Water Power Supplies repairman
Date of Death: February 16, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: August 3, 2008
Most recent place of detention: Changsha County Detention Center (长沙县拘留所)
City: Chang Sha County
Province: Hunan
Persecution Suffered: Forced labor, forced injections/drug administration, torture, home ransacked, interrogation, detention
(Clearwisdom.net) (By a correspondent from Hunan Province) Falun Gong practitioner, Mr. Yu Yong was previously employed by Hunan Province Eighth Water Power Bureau. He quit his job, and worked as a handyman repairing water power equipment.
In December 2005, he explained to people the facts about Falun Gong and the persecution, and passed out informational materials. He was reported for doing this, and arrested. The police ransacked his home, took his home appliances that were newly purchased before his wedding, as well as his older brother's computer and printer. Local officer Chen Yibin (also appointed as a 610 Office agent) and Chen Yiming, Changsha County 610 Office chair, harassed his family multiple times, threatened them, and tried to extort several thousand yuan from them.
In May 2006, Mr. Yu was sent to Xinkaipu Forced Labor Camp for a one year term. During his incarceration, he firmly held onto his faith, did not give in , and was thus cruelly tortured and injected with unknown drugs. He developed high blood pressure, with a systolic reading of 200 mm.
In May 2007, he was released, but was very weak. His wife did not work, his aging mother was ill, and he had a six year-old daughter, so he worked in Ningxiang County to support the family.
On August 3, 2008, Changsha County 610 Office agents detained him in Changsha County Detention Center, using the excuse of "Olympic safety." After that, Mr. Yu felt sick and depressed. He died during his sleep on the night of February 15, 2009, at home. His face, ears, and feet were purple, causing his family to suspect that one of the unknown drugs he was injected with had killed him. But they dared not take any action to investigate.
Antonin Dvorak's Symphony Number 5
Antonín Leopold Dvořák (September 8, 1841 – May 1, 1904) was a Czech composer of Romantic music, who employed the idioms and melodies of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. His works include operas, symphonic, choral and chamber music. His best-known works include his New World Symphony, the Slavonic Dances, "American" String Quartet, and Cello Concerto in B minor.
LA Times Letter to the Editor: My mother and sister, prisoners of China's Communist Party
October 13, 2009
China's leaders meant for the celebrations on Oct. 1 to remind the world of their country's growing power and importance. But the 60th anniversary of the communist revolution, which Nina Hachigian wrote about in her Sept. 30 Times Op-Ed article, should also remind us of something else: The Chinese Communist Party is still very much an authoritarian regime whose nature remains quite the same as when Mao Tse-tung brutalized the nation.
I should know. About four months ago, my mother, Yao-Hua Li, and sister, Yi-Bo Zhang, were abducted by Chinese police officers simply because of their spiritual beliefs.
Just as millions of Chinese citizens did in the 1990s, my family embraced the Buddhist spiritual discipline of Falun Gong. The practice combines meditation and a moral philosophy based on the principles of truth, compassion and tolerance. It enabled my mother to find relief from severe back pains and gave us all a more positive outlook on life.
The Chinese Communist Party, however, viewed the growing spiritual movement as a threat and banned the Falun Gong faith in 1999. Since then, international observers have reported that more than 100,000 Falun Gong adherents have been sent to forced-labor camps, and thousands have been tortured (many to death) because they refused to recant their beliefs.
Though I had feared that my family members in China could be victimized under this persecution, I had assumed they were safe. After all, my mother has Hong Kong residency, and my sister was a successful financial manager with a well-known international corporation. I thought this would give them some level of protection.
I was wrong.
Their fate will be determined by the local 610 Office, a Gestapo-like organization charged with persecuting Falun Gong adherents. All around the world, people and governments look to the United States for leadership on human rights. This is precisely why lawmakers and business leaders need to keep the countless number of people such as my mother and sister in mind when engaging with China's leaders.
The values of human rights and freedom are not just American values; they are universal. A relationship can only be healthy and long-lasting when it is built on shared values, not just shared interests, which are temporary and ever-changing.
This is why I am very thankful that 77 members of Congress, including California Reps. Maxine Waters, Ed Royce, Darrell Issa, Duncan D. Hunter, Dana Rohrabacher and Adam Schiff, have co-sponsored HR 605, which recognizes the ongoing persecution of the Falun Gong spiritual movement and calls for an immediate end to the campaign to persecute, intimidate, imprison and torture its practitioners. After his trip to China in August, Berman described Chinese officials as being "very open" to expanding human rights in their country. For the sake of my family and so many others, I hope he supports HR 605 and takes advantage of the openness to which he attests. My mother and sister are waiting.
On June 4, exactly 20 years to the day after the massacre at Tiananmen Square, my mother and sister were taken from their home in Shanghai and sent to jail for no other reason than the fact that they practice the Falun Gong faith. They still haven't been charged with a crime or brought to trial (even if they do get a trial, it would be a farce). I searched high and low in Shanghai, a city of more than 20 million people, and I could not find one lawyer with the courage to take their case.
My family is not alone in our suffering. According to the U.S. State Department's 2008 country report on human rights, Falun Gong adherents are estimated to make up as much as half of China's labor camp population. They also account for two-thirds of the torture cases in China, according to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture.
The resolution is being reviewed by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, which is chaired by Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Valley Village). There are millions of people suffering persecution in China, not just my family and not just Falun Gong adherents. Every single one of them would join me in my hope for Congress to pass this resolution.
Fruit and veg have 'unacceptable' levels of pesticides
Many fruit and vegetables sold in supermarkets and greengrocers contain pesticide residues that are above the maximum legal level, an in-depth report has said.
Apples, peas, and grapes are sometimes covered in crop spray that is above the maximum allowed levels allowed under European law.
The findings come from the Pesticides Residues Committee, part of the Health and Safety Executive, after testing more than 4,000 samples of food and drink.
The levels of pesticides varied considerably, with imported fruit and vegetables tending to have higher levels, according to its 2008 annual report. One in 7 beans in a pod one in 25 fresh peas (in pods) and one in five yams all had pesticides above the allowed level. One in 70 apples and pears had illegal levels of pesticides.
The Food Standards Agency insisted the illegal levels did not necessarily mean that the food was unsafe to eat, and pointed out that the overall levels of pesticides in food had fallen over the last year. In 2007 1.8 per cent of food had illegal levels; 2008 it had fallen to 1.2 per cent.
All of the fruit and vegetables supplied to schools contained pesticides within allowed levels, though nearly all the apples (49 out of 52 tested) and every one of the bananas had some form of pesticide in them. Many of the pieces of fruit had more than one pesticide.
The Soil Association, which represents the organic industry, said the report was alarming nonetheless.
Emma Hockridge, policy co-ordinator at the Soil Association, said: "Unbelievably we learn yet again that pesticides are turning up in fruit and vegetables supplied to schoolchildren. Yet again the government tells us this is nothing to be worried about.
"Yet we know that children’s exposure and susceptibility to pesticides is likely to be higher as per body weight they ingest more food and drink than adults and their bodies' ability to process and excrete any such residues is different to that of adults.
"It is unacceptable that 94 per cent of apples, and 100 per cent of bananas tested contained pesticides school fruit and vegetable scheme."
She argued that the "cocktail" effect of different pesticides had never been tested properly. "Powerful new evidence is emerging that suggests the combined effect of pesticide ‘mixtures’ may be more significant than previously realised, especially with regard to endocrine disruptors," she said.
Pesticides, at high doses, can cause allergic reactions such as causing itchy skin and breathing difficulties.
Dr Ian Brown, the chairman of the committee that wrote the report, said: "I understand that people are concerned about pesticide residues in their food, but as a doctor I cannot state too strongly the importance of eating at least five portions of fruit and vegetables a day. Scientific evidence shows that the health benefits are far greater than the risk from pesticide residues."
After Enduring Ten Years of Brutal Persecution, Falun Gong Practitioner, Ms. Yang Xiaojing Dies While Husband Still in Prison
Name: Yang Xiaojing (杨小晶) (Clearwisdom.net) (Correspondent from Beijing) At 6 a.m. on October 1, 2009, after being long term harassed, threatened, and cruelly persecuted, Ms. Yang Xiaojing died while her husband Mr. Cao Dong remains in Gansu Province Prison located in Tianshui City. Wedding photo of Mr. Cao Dong and Ms. Yang Xiaojing Ms. Yang graduated from Information System Department of Beijing Forestry University. She married Mr. Cao Dong on February 24, 2000. On March 5, 2000, Mr. Cao went back to his home in Qingyang City, Gansu Province to process his residential permit from Qingyang to Beijing. On thhise way back to Beijing, he was arrested with fellow practitioner Mr. Gao Feng on the train, and they were both detained for 17 days in a Drug Rehabilitation Center in the Inner-Mongolia Autonomous Region. Ms. Yang's honeymoon was full of terror and worry. The CCP Secretary of her employer, Wang Xiuyan, tried to force her to write a guarantee statement to stop practicing Falun Gong many times and threatened her: The administration mandated that if there was one Falun Gong practitioner in the Institute that did not accept the brainwashing, the administrators' bonus pay would be gone, and all of the staff's bonuses and housing benefits would all be deducted. In order to avoid her employer and colleague being complicated by her beliefs, she was forced to quit her job. On October 1, 2000, the local police came to Ms. Yang's home and told the couple go to the police station. They refused, and they were forced to leave their home to avoid being arrested. From then on, they lost their home and did not have a source of income. On May 21, 2001, Ms. Yang went back home to take a shower and was arrested by officer Wu Liya who had been waiting for her with other officers. They took her to a temporary brainwashing facility located in the Phoenix Hotel in Dongcheng District. Ms. Yang went on hunger strike for seven whole days to protest the persecution. The police took her to the Dongcheng District Detention Center. They saw that she refused to accept the brainwashing and were afraid she would go appeal for Falun Gong, so they sent her to the Fifth Ward of the Beijing Women's Labor Camp with an 18-month term. Warden Chen Aihua personally instructed prisoners to cruelly torture Ms. Yang, force her to stand a long time, not allow her to sleep, and give her bad food or water to drink. On May 12, 2002, CCTV broadcasted the fabricated incident of "Guan Shuyun killing her daughter" to defame Falun Gong. The Camp Administration started another round of severe torture of practitioners. Under the huge pressure, Ms. Yang accepted the brainwashing against her will. After that, Ms. Yang suffered from an unclear mind, which lasted to 2003. She was released on November 30, 2002. At the end of December 2002, she had not fully recovered from the mental and physical torture, but she had to visit her husband who was in the Pingliang Prison in Gansu Province with a four and half year-term. She rented a room in Pingliang City for 11 months and endured many hardships. In April 2004, six agents from Beijing's Yayun Village Police Station in Chaoyang District and officials from the Domestic Security Division of the Chaoyang District Police Department broke into Ms. Yang's parents' home. They ransacked it and also Ms. Yang's home. Ms. Yang was once again arrested and held in the First Division of the Beijing Women's Forced Labor Camp. Ms. Yang Xiaojing experienced the brutality of the "Attack Ward" in February 2005. Starting at 5:00 a.m. she had to sit on a "high board" (a 60 centimeter or about 23.62 inches-tall square plastic stool). She could only sit on the side of it with her feet together. Her feet and legs had to be held together, or otherwise, she would be beaten. Her hands, with her fingers closed, had to rest on her thighs, and her eyes had to look straight ahead. If she closed her eyes or got sleepy, she would be beaten. She had to sit on the bench all day except for when she was eating. Some practitioners fell from the "high board" after sitting on it for several days. Their buttocks developed festers. During that period, their daily rations for each meal consisted of a scant portion of rice. Practitioners were forbidden to sleep until 12:00 a.m. Two inmates double-teamed a single practitioner in a cell, and several inmates took turns monitoring a practitioner. They recorded everything the practitioner did. They forced the practitioner to keep sitting on the "high board" until they had "reformed." The "Attack Ward" was not disbanded until August 2005. In September 2005 the officials returned Ms. Yang Xiaojing to the First Ward. She was weak, but head Chen Li forced her to take on heavy-duty work that required her to have her head down for a long time, which resulted in severe neck pain. In order to rescue Ms. Yang, on May 21, 2006, Mr. Cao Dong met with European Parliament Vice President Mr. Edward McMillan-Scott in Beijing on May 21, 2006. Mr. Cao informed Mr. McMillan-Scott of the brutal persecution suffered by himself, his wife, and other practitioners around him. Two hours after the meeting, Chinese Communist regime security agents arrested Mr. Cao and transported him back to his hometown in Gansu Province. Mr. Cao was sentenced to five years of imprisonment on February 8, 2007 and has since been detained at the Tianshui Prison in Gansu Province. At the end of August 2006, Ms. Yang Xiaojing was released after being abused at the Beijing Women's Forced Labor Camp. She sought help in making her voice known to the public, but the Communist regime agents threatened her. Mr. Cao Dong was inhumanly tortured. He was secretly detained in Beijing for more than three months. During those days, his left eye became bloodshot due to being beaten and he was cuffed onto a chair for more than a dozen hours daily for one month, deprived his right to sleep, forced to watch loud slanderous videos, etc. Mr. Cao began vomit blood, passed blood, and fainted once, and he was rushed to the hospital three times. He was once taken to the Chaoyang District Brainwashing Center. In order to escape international condemnation, the police transferred Mr. Cao to be secretly detained in the Gansu Province State Security Department Detention Center at the beginning of September 2006. The regime agents issued a formal arrest warrant on September 30, 2006 and delivered it to Mr. Cao Dong's parents in Qingyang City, Gansu Province, but Ms. Yang was not informed until the end of October 2006. To seek justice for her husband, Ms. Yang began to travel between Beijing, Lanzhou City, Pingliang City, and Qingyang City to look for a defense lawyer for her husband. In February 2007 Mr. Cao was tried in Lanzhou City, Gaosu Province. The defense lawyer successfully argued for a reduction in criminal charges. The lawyer also agreed to continue to appeal for Mr. Cao. However, under the duress of National Security Bureau agents, the lawyer was afraid to mention the CCP harvesting living practitioners' organs during the second trial, which ended with a written statement in March 2007. In August 2007, Ms. Yang and Mr. Cao Dong's friend, musician Mr. Yu Zhou, contacted lawyers for help. Soon afterwards, Mr. Yu Zhou was arrested. Ms. Yang became homeless and had to move from place to place to avoid persecution. Ms. Yang saw her husband at the Tianshui Prison at the end of 2007. He described his ordeals to her during the brief visit, grieving her even more. In December 2007, Ms. Yang went back to Beijing. On December 27, she went back home to pay the rent. Employees from the local Community Center who had been stationed outside her home reported her to the police. Policemen Liu Jiang and Liu Tao from the Jianguomen Police Station, Yang Zhongwen, director of the local 610 Office and another two policemen from the Dongcheng District Police Station broke into her home, forcibly carried her downstairs, and pushed her into a car. They drove her to the Dongzhimen Police Station. Section Chief Liu Yugang cruelly said, "We insisted on putting Cao Dong in a prison in Northwestern China while leaving you in Beijing." Afterwards, several plainclothes police carried Ms. Yang to a black car and took her to a hotel in the Liuliqiao area of Fengtai District and detained her there for a full day. After being released, Ms. Yang found that her house key had been taken, and there were two vehicles parked under her parent's home building. She was once again forced into exile in the cold winter. Ms. Yang heard the news about Mr. Yu Zhou and his wife Ms. Xu Na's arrest in February 2008. Mr. Yu Zhou died as a result of brutality in March, and Ms. Yang wept for her friend. The grief and pressure almost caused her to mentally collapse, and soon after she became physically weak. In July 2008, she developed lumps in her neck and underarms, which led to a diagnosis of lymphoma at the beginning of August 2008 at the Xijin Hospital in Xi'an City, Shaanxi Province. Ms. Yang lived in pain. She could not lie down normally, nor could she eat much. Ms. Yang Xiaojing's elderly parents were worried about their daughter. Community Administration Office Head Li Heping often called to harass and monitor them. Agents came to their home to harass them on sensitive dates. Her 72-year-old father had to stay in Xi'an City and take care of his sick daughter. The old couple used their limited retirement funds to support Ms. Yang, who was struggling in extreme pain. Finally, she became jaundiced, her legs swelled, and her left breast developed lumps. She had not been able to lie down since July 2009. She died at 5 a.m. on October 1, 2009, in Xi'an City. At 5 p.m. on October 1, 2009, Ms. Yang's elderly father drove seven hours to rush to Tianshui Prison and begged the prison administration to allow Mr. Cao Dong to see his wife one last time. Wardens Zhou and Liu Jiangtao refused with the excuse that during the October First National Day vacation season, no administrators were present to make decision. They told the old man to wait until the vacation was over.
Gender: Female
Age: 45
Address: Beijing
Occupation: Computing Office of Beijing Power Facility Design Institute (北京供电豕计院计算机室)
Date of Death: October 1, 2009
Date of Most Recent Arrest: December 27, 2009
Most Recent Place of Detention: A hotel located in Liuliqiao Community, Fengtai District, Beijing (丰台六里桥一家旅馆)
City: Beijing
Persecution Suffered: Electric Shock, Sleep Deprivation, Forced Labor, Brainwashing, Illegal Sentencing, Forced Injections/Drug Administration, Beatings, Hung Up, Imprisonment, Solitary Confinement, Torture, Rape, Sexual Assault, Force-Feedings, Extortion, Fired from Workplace, Physical Restraint, Mental Hospital, Home Ransacked, Interrogation, Detention 
Visual arts of the United States
(Wikipedia)
Visual arts of the United States refers to the history of painting and visual art in the United States. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, artists primarily painted landscapes and portraits in a realistic style. A parallel development taking shape in rural America was the American craft movement, which began as a reaction to the industrial revolution. Developments in modern art in Europe came to America from exhibitions in New York City such as the Armory Show in 1913. Previously American Artists had based the majority of their work on Western Painting and European Arts. After World War II, New York replaced Paris as the center of the art world. Since then many American Movements have shaped Modern and Post Modern art. Art in the United States today covers a huge range of styles.
Albert Bierstadt, The Rocky Mountains, Lander's Peak, 1863, Hudson River School
Eighteenth century
After the Declaration of Independence in 1776, which marked the official beginning of the American national identity, the new nation needed a history, and part of that history would be expressed visually. Most of early American art (from the late 18th century through the early 19th century) consists of history painting and portraits. Painters such as Gilbert Stuart made portraits of the newly elected government officials, while John Singleton Copley was painting emblematic portraits for the increasingly prosperous merchant class, and painters such as John Trumbull were making large battle scenes of the Revolutionary War.
Nineteenth century
America's first well-known school of painting—the Hudson River School—appeared in 1820. As with music and literature, this development was delayed until artists perceived that the New World offered subjects unique to itself; in this case the westward expansion of settlement brought the transcendent beauty of frontier landscapes to painters' attention.
The Hudson River painters' directness and simplicity of vision influenced such later artists as Winslow Homer (1836-1910), who depicted rural America—the sea, the mountains, and the people who lived near them. Middle-class city life found its painter in Thomas Eakins (1844-1916), an uncompromising realist whose unflinching honesty undercut the genteel preference for romantic sentimentalism. Henry Ossawa Tanner who studied with Thomas Eakins was one of the first important African American painters.
Paintings of the Great West, particularly the act of conveying the sheer size of the land and the cultures of the native people living on it, were starting to emerge as well. Artists such as George Catlin broke from traditional styles of showing land, most often done to show how much a subject owned, to show the West and its people as honestly as possible.
Many painters who are considered American spent some time in Europe and met other European artists in Paris and London, such as Mary Cassatt.
Twentieth Century
Controversy soon became a way of life for American artists. In fact, much of American painting and sculpture since 1900 has been a series of revolts against tradition. "To hell with the artistic values," announced Robert Henri (1865-1929). He was the leader of what critics called the Ashcan school of painting, after the group's portrayals of the squalid aspects of city life. American realism became the new direction for American visual artists at the turn of the century. In photography the Photo-Secession movement led by Alfred Steiglitz made pathways for photography as an emerging art form. Soon the Ashcan school artists gave way to modernists arriving from Europe—the cubists and abstract painters promoted by the photographer Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1946) at his 291 Gallery in New York City. John Marin, Marsden Hartley, Alfred Henry Maurer, Arthur Dove, Henrietta Shore, Stuart Davis, Stanton MacDonald-Wright, Morgan Russell, Patrick Henry Bruce, and Gerald Murphy were some important early American modernist painters.
After World War I many American artists also rejected the modern trends emanating from the Armory Show and European influences such as those from the School of Paris. Instead they chose to adopt academic realism in depicting American urban and rural scenes. Charles Sheeler, and Charles Demuth were referred to as Precisionists and the artists from the Ashcan school or American realism: notably George Bellows, Everett Shinn, George Benjamin Luks, William Glackens, and John Sloan and others developed socially conscious imagery in their works.
Nighthawks (1942) by Edward Hopper is one of his best known works, Art Institute of Chicago.
Other Modern American Movements
Members of the next artistic generation favored a different form of abstraction: works of mixed media. Among them were Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008) and Jasper Johns (1930- ), who used photos, newsprint, and discarded objects in their compositions. Pop artists, such as Andy Warhol (1930-1987), Larry Rivers (1923-2002), and Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997), reproduced, with satiric care, everyday objects and images of American popular culture—Coca-Cola bottles, soup cans, comic strips. Realism has also been popular in the United States, despite modernist tendencies, such as the city scenes by Edward Hopper and the illustrations of Norman Rockwell. In certain places, for example Chicago, Abstract Expressionism never caught on; in Chicago, the dominant art style was grotesque, symbolic realism, as exemplified by the Chicago Imagists Cosmo Campoli (1923-1997).
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