Chinese art students scrawled Communist graffiti in London’s Brick Lane

IN THE WINTER of 1978, two years after the death of the Communist leader Mao Zedong, Chinese intellectuals began pasting political posters on a wall near Beijing’s Forbidden City. Chinese authorities tolerated this “Democracy Wall” at first. But they soon clamped down. A curious inversion of this episode unfolded in London around August 6th when Chinese art students daubed Communist Party slogans on a wall in Brick Lane, a street famed for its curry houses and arts scene. Spray-painted in bright red paint against a white background were 24 large Chinese characters outlining the party’s 12 “core socialist values”. They included “harmony”, “patriotism” and “rule of law”.