我出生地佛山，祖籍四会。珠叁角风调雨顺，呈亚洲大陆之底托：“好物沈归底。”这裡物產资本丰厚奇特，就是叁皇五帝也层出不穷：从秦始皇帝派来赵佗封大庾岭做南越王开始，唐代四会生出个禪宗六祖慧能，末代宋朝在肇庆定都六十年。清末民初帝王将相更是车水马龙：天王花县洪秀全，辅王嘉应杨辅清，翼王兴寧石达开，南王花县冯云山，临时大总统香山孙逸仙，国务总理珠海唐绍仪，国民主席叁水汪精卫，代主席南海陈公博，第一夫人南海宋美龄，国家主席宋庆龄，军委元帅梅州叶剑英，九龙皇帝曾灶财，功夫大王佛山李小龙，打工皇帝香港许冠杰……就连不是广东人的蒋介石，毛泽东，胡志明，邓小平都在广东挖宝：办军校，开农讲所，娶老婆，建经济特区，一国两制，功成名就，纵观广东出產王皇多如牛毛，唯独还少一个广东王，现值香港汉雅轩补来。

杨诘苍
二零一二春
在巴黎

I was born in Foshan but my family originally came from Sihui. The Pearl River Delta has always been blessed with weather conducive to good crops, thereby making it the agricultural foundation of the Asian continent; or, as the old saying goes, “the best is found at the bottom”. Local production is extremely abundant. Emperors or kings have never been lacking: the first being Zhao Tuo, King of Nanyue, who was sent to Dayu Mountain by the First Emperor of Qin. During the Tang Dynasty, Huineng, the Sixth Patriarch of Zen Buddhism was born in Sihui. In the final years of the Song Dynasty, Zhaoqing served as their capital for sixty years. In the final decades of the Qing Dynasty and at the beginning of the Republic, this area produced even more successive kings and persons of prominence: during the Taiping Rebellion, there was the Heavenly King, Hong Xiuquan of Hua County; “Fu Wang (Assistant King)”, Yang Fuqing of Jiaying; the Wing King, Shi Dakai of Xingning; and the South King, Feng Yunshan also of Hua County. These were later followed by Sun Yat-sen of Xiangshan, Provisional President of the Republic of China; Tang Shaoyi of Zhuhai, Prime Minister of the Republic of China; Wang Jingwei of Sanshui, Chairman of the Nationalist Government; Chen Gongbo of Nanhai, Acting Chairman of the Nationalist Government; Soong May-ling of Nanhai, First Lady of the Republic of China; Soong Qin-ling, Head of State of the People's Republic of China; Ye Jianying of Meizhou, General and a member of the Military Commission; Tsang Tsou Choi, “King of Kowloon”; Bruce Lee of Foshan, “King of Kung Fu”; and Samuel Hui of Hong Kong, “Emperor of Workers”…Even personages from other provinces, such as Chiang Kai-shek, Mao Zedong, Ho Chi Minh, and Deng Xiaoping, all utilized the land and talents of Guangdong, i.e. by establishing a military school, opening a Peasant Movement Institute, marrying a Cantonese wife, and initiating the Special Economic Zone, as well as putting into action the “one country, two systems”; all of which became successful and renowned. The above shows that though Guangdong has produced many emperors or kings, we have yet to find a “King of Guangdong”. Now is the time for Hong Kong’s Hanart TZ Gallery to fill this gap.

Yang Jiechang
Paris, Spring 2012
English translation by Diane Lu