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Hi everyone, I’m Linjie Deng. On July 25th, 1992, I was born in China. On the Second day I haven't had my own name yet, I’ve already got my own death certificate. Why? Because from 1980, the government of China enforced a one-child policy. In my family, I have two older sisters. That is very rare. In order to keeping my family safe and alive, I have to “die on paper, live in a lie”. Sadly I could not go to school because I cannot have Chinese citizenship. My parents hid me from the police in their storage and wouldn't let me call them Mom and Dad. They told me if anyone asks that I am not one of Deng family. Do not talk to strangers. But no one tells me: “who am I.” I was depressed after I “died”. If I’m not allowed to speak, then I will write. I started practicing calligraphy when I was six years old. I write on my body with a brush every day: Hello, I am Linjie Deng. This is the only way I can tell the world who I am. Fortunately, with the help of my teachers, I went to the Art School of Beijing City University in 2011. Sadly, whenever I go home, people still call me “ugly balls”. Because they still remember me as the unnecessary child. But I don’t look at myself in that way. I wanted to to discover myself in a new world. I decided to apply American graduate school. Good thing is I got an offer from the School of Visual Arts in New York. Problem is I don’t have enough money for the tuition. So I started to sell my Chinese calligraphy artworks to art collectors by Chinese social media. I got $80k within 7 days and headed to New York. It was 2015, I was 23 years-old, my first time away from China, my first time in the USA, and my first time in an airplane. It’s both scary and exciting. But I get to decide who I want to be. Because no one has ever met me before. I can create my own identity. Later on I realized that part of my new identity is: gay. And there are over 30 million gay men in China. That’s like California’s entire state population. But 90% of Chinese gay men have to fake it by marrying a woman in order to make their parents happy. All built on a lie. But I don’t want to live in a lie again. On January 1st, 2017, I stood in Beijing Square, blindfolded, wearing a white outfit that said: “I am gay, would you like to give me a hug?” I was nervous, because I had no idea what would happen next. Then I heard a gentle voice: “ Hello, I don’t know you, but I support you.” That was my first hug. I remember a girl said in my ear: “Sorry I got my lipstick on your clothes. Can I wash them for you?” Later on more and more people stopped by to give me hugs and take photos. Even someone kissed my neck. Suddenly, three police men come over, took off my blindfold and asked me to leave. Otherwise they will take me to police station. 65 people gave me a hug in just the first hour. I shared a video of the performance on social media. The video got three million plays within 5 days. I received many positive feedbacks. Two Chinese guys decided to come out after watching the video. One of the most moving feedbacks was when a father said that he now felt the freedom to discuss the topic of being gay with his son. Weibo(Chinese twitter) removed my video from the ‘Hot List’, because the content was ‘restricted’ because it feature the word ‘gay.’ So, I did another work. I created Togayther, a gay liberation movement on Chinese social media. I asked people to: Shoot a selfie video to answer: What would you do if your child was gay? Upload it to Chinese social media and hashtag #Togayther Invite 3 friends to do the same Almost 500 of Togayther videos were posted within a week. That was a much bigger response than I could have ever hoped for. Later almost four hundred thousand people participated in the movement , it was like a snowball effect. The government can keep a few people quiet, but can not keep everybody quiet. The only way to truly break the lie is by working “togayther”. In June 2015, my togayther performance art was published by Bruno Gmünder, one of the world’s largest gay publishing companies. For a long time after that, I kept addressing social issues with my art. In March 2021, I was attacked at 86th street New York subway station. The guy told me I was f**king yellow while violently shoving me to the ground. I was lucky he didn't push me under the train. So created six works all yellow. Carlton Fine Arts Gallery on Madison Avenue hosted my solo show titled: Asian Art SPA. One of the most popular paintings was the Fortune Cookie, in which the fortune itself states "Stop Asian Hate. Start American Love.” And all proceeds I donated to The Think! Chinatown non-profit organization to help the Asian community standing together. In the past few years, my art has been featured at several art fairs. Such as SCOPE at Art Basel Miami Beach, Hamptons Fine Art Fair. As an artist, I have had the opportunity to speak with so many different people. I met a lot of American families who have adopted Chinese daughters and many of them are gay families. These girls, who were discarded during the one child policy, are now healthy and confident under the nurturing of American gay parents. Some of them went to New York University and Columbia University. So I created Superhero Super Gay. I want to tell anyone tonight still believe they’re better off dead than being themselves. You don't need to wait for Superman to save you, you are your own superhero. you are super gay. So the life experiences of a gay boy who suffered from the one chid policy and then regained a sense of accomplishment and control in his life has done it with help of his friends, family and community. Next month, I am going to have a new exhibition Double Sided at Hamptons Fine Art Fair. I’d like to invite everyone to come. Hopefully you will be part of my art journey when we meet again. Thank You.