Interviews with Artists Featured in the “Uncompromising Courage” Exhibit: “The People’s Tribunal” by Kathleen Gillis

[Editors’ Note: After the Chinese dictator Jiang Zemin and his regime started persecuting Falun Gong practitioners in the 20th of July, 1999, those Falun Gong practitioners who are artists by profession hope to express the joy that Falun Gong practitioners have experienced since they started cultivating in Falun Gong, their invincible righteousness that helps them brave the cruel tortures and bloody persecution, their continuous pursuit of Falun Gong’s cultivation principles of Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance, and their faith that righteousness shall ultimately prevail over evil.]

Oil Painting “The People’s Tribunal” by Kathleen Gillis

Reporter: Did you paint “The People’s Tribunal” from a photo?

Kathy: No, not a particular photo. I was there, and I was taking photos when I was there. Then I used elements of several photos and made them into one image. The Falun Gong practitioners in their yellow shirts are grouped together in such a way that they form a yellow shape that points to the puppet of Jiang Zemin. The beings in the sky are compassionately watching.

Reporter: Did anyone tell you what was in the sky or you just did these figures based on your understanding?

Kathy: No, no one particularly told me. At first I had a lot of doubts about portraying anything that I had not seen. But then when I thought about it, I realised that I don’t just paint what I see, I also paint what I know.

Reporter: What message do you want to leave those who see this painting with?

Kathy: There are a few Westerners in the painting. I wanted to give the viewers a chance to relate to it and not to think of it as something happening in another country, but rather something happening right here. I remember one time when I was at Parliament Hill, a woman came up to me and she said, “Why don’t you take your problems back to where you came from?” I am a Westerner. She has such a strong impression that this was somebody else’s problem that she didn't even register my ethnic origin. People just want to dismiss it: it is on the other side of the earth and it does not affect them. But it does affect them.

Oil Painting “The Heavens Speak” by Kathleen Gillis

Reporter: Another painting of yours is entitled, “The Heavens Speak,” you must have a story for that one. Could you tell me about it?

Kathy: I was in Houston, and was “drowned” by the tremendous rain and cold. Wherever Jiang was, that black cloud would follow. It hung over his hotel, and then it moved on to the President’s ranch when he was there. So it was as black as it appears in the painting, very dense, very black, very threatening. At one point in time, the rainbow appeared at one side of the sky. We looked at the beautiful rainbow, and we kind of relaxed and celebrated. It wasn’t until much later that I knew that at that point, as we were relaxed, it gave the chance for Jiang to recover. The appearance of that beautiful rainbow encouraged us to let down our guard.

Reporter: Could you interpret the different parts of the painting, the sky, the rainbow, and the people on the ground?

Kathy: In the sky there is a battle being fought out on horse-back in the clouds. But I did not want it be too obvious or let people see it right away. I want people to see it after they have looked at other things first. The turmoil in the sky was what I felt then and the manifestation of the emotions is played out in the conflict there. The image of the single figure in the sky that appears to be descending; this image came to me in a dream. I woke up in the morning and this image was in my mind.

Reporter: what did you want the viewer to see at the first sight?

Kathy: The viewers would be led through the painting in a very natural way. They will follow the road to the rainbow, or follow the rainbow down. The sky will come afterwards. When you get close up, you will see the figures in the sky. I used strong colour as arrows to point the directions, pointing up or pointing in. They all go to the focal point.

Oil Painting of two children reading Zhuan Falun by Kathleen Gillis

Reporter: The next painting of yours is entitled, "Two kids reading a book, Zhuan Falun". Could you tell a little about its background?

Kathy: I wanted to have something very homely, very familiar to Westerners. I started with a combination of two things. One was something I had seen on the Internet; a practitioner standing up reading a Falun Dafa book in public. Over his head, there was a red blur. When my husband saw it, he said:”Look at the face!” I was intrigued by that. I had not seen the face at first. So I combined this image with two little children reading in a very domestic setting. Later on, I learnt that the red was actually a series of Falun (Law Wheels). When they move, they form that red arc. The head is a cultivated being.

Reporter: Those two kids are very cute, did you use any models?

Kathy: They are my grand kids. I took a photo of them for this. But they have not see the painting yet.

Reporter: In western paintings, there are scenes about the human world and heaven in the same painting. Your paintings have multiple dimensions as well, although it is not the same.

Kathy: Actually I think people don’t really understand that any more. They think of a painting in terms of its composition, its colour, and they have forgotten about the content, the meaning carried by the image, they have forgotten how to look.