MAO, Zedong.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Rubber bust from the Cultural Revolution. A piece of political portraiture, produced at the Mao cult's apotheosis, to celebrate his 15 August 1968 audience with exemplary revolutionaries in Beijing's Great Hall of the People.By 1968, the Cultural Revolution had produced a hyper-politicized society framed around the imparting of significance to Mao's every word and deed. Audiences with the Chairman, where he addressed student and worker representatives from the capital, as well as those who had come from other parts of China, symbolized, for attendees, Mao's affirmation of their revolutionary credentials. Organizations produced busts, badges, and other items celebrating such events.The present example concerns one such convocation, reported with much fanfare in the state newspaper, the People's Daily, on 16 August 1968: "Smiling broadly, glowing with health, and radiating vigour, Mao, together with Vice-Chairman Lin Biao, his closest comrade in arms, arrived at the hall amidst extremely warm and rapturous applause, greeting the capital's representatives of the proletariat as well as other political soldiers. Chairman Mao spent considerable time warmly and energetically waving and applauding those assembled, and shook hands with leading representatives on the ceremonial platform".With easy access to rubber, workers from Beijing huagong er chang (Beijing Number Two Chemical Plant) cast this souvenir design, also using the inscription to reference Mao's famous gift of mangoes to

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