Post-Tiananmen blues

By Edward Neilan
Special to World Tribune.com

TOKYO--Tickets to photo exhibitions recollecting the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy student demonstrations and subsequent crackdown by Chinese soldiers, weren't exactly selling like hotcakes in Japan.

Ask American David Gregory,38, a business consultant and part-time photographer, from Chicago who thinks he sees a growing apathy toward Tiananmen worldwide.

" Even the one-time dissidents who took part in the demonstrations, whom I visited in the U.S are now into 'other things,'"said Gregory in an interview at his exhibition "Images of China's 1989 Democracy Movement--Sixteen Days in China Before and After Tiananmen Square."

Gregory was a graduate student at Wake Forrest University on a study tour of China in 1989 when the crackdown occurred. His group visited Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Hong Kong, chronicling images from a travelers viewpoint through 200 photographs.

"The contrast between expressions on the faces of the students before and after the crackdown was dramatic as shown in these photographs," a student member of the group was quoted.

Gregory has tried unsuccessfully to sell the exhibition as a book project to several publishers but they said that he had "nothing new" and "There's not a market for Tiananmen any more."

I signed the guest book on a blank page that said, hopefully, "Sunday, June 6, 1999." I was the only visitor that morning. There had been six the day before.

"The Japanese kids who come here have never heard of Tiananmen," Gregory said.

Gregory approached me two days earlier following my appearance in a panel discussion "Recalling Tiananmen" in which I had appeared with other correspondents: Pulitzer Prize-winning Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn of The New York Times and Bruce Dunning, CBS Tokyo Bureau Chief. Moderator was Bob Neff, Business Week and President of of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan, where the event was held. There were about 50 guests at the luncheon, mainly other journalists and public affairs wonks.

The panel pretty much agreed on "400 to 800" killed and "thousands injured" as credible casualty figures and that "Tiananmen" or "Tiananmen event" might survive longer than "Tiananmen massacre."

Gregory's disappointing experience might be written off to "market miscalculation," "timing," "misplaced expectations," and other mistakes. Maybe he was guilty of being one of those naive, idealistic Americans roaming around Asia in search of good causes to support.

Except for one thing: Japanese establishment censorship.

In looking for sponsors to provide a hall to display his work, Gregory was finally successful when a major Japanese utility agreed.

"China," "students," democracy " were all good themes, the utility's public relations board agreed.

The exhibition was set up and ready to go when a senior member of the utility visited the site.

Whoops! Hold the phone. Although none of the photographs were of the June 3-4 brutalities, there was enough grimacing between students and authorities to make the photographs seem controversial.

The official told Gregory point blank that because of Japan's delicate relations with China, it would be difficult to allow the exhibition to proceed. He mentioned Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi's forthcoming trip to China.

The utility pulled the plug on the show, virtually on the eve of its opening. A Japanese "live house" ANGA--"The Heart of Chiba"--usually known for dueling high school bands and jazz instrumental solos, came to the rescue. Manager Masakazu Noguchi said Gregory could use the upstairs jazz house to display the photographs during daytime hours.

Gregory hastily reprinted postcards and flyers and moved his exhibition acoss town.

His thousands of dollars of out of-pocket expenses were compensated for by the utility, whose only stipulation was that it not be mentioned by name.

"Hush money?" "A bribe?" . Hey, this is Asia.

Remember Tiananmen Square!

Edward Neilan (eneilan@crisscross.com) is a veteran journalist, based in Tokyo, who covers East Asia and writes weekly for World Tribune.com.