Riding the wind of rebirth

"However, the facts are disappointing. After the precious cultural heritage that should have been under its protection was stolen, a power that did not attach importance to the protection of its own cultural relics innocently shifted the attention of the public to me in order to divert public opinion. This is absolutely unacceptable."

"Since my client was involved in the lawsuit, the business of his art gallery has plummeted. The once busy business has become a deserted situation. He has also been deliberately guided by public opinion and faced too many unwarranted accusations from the public who do not know the truth. He is under great psychological pressure and has even affected his personal health."

"Objection! Your Honor, please ask the other party to make a statement on the case and not bring in too much irrelevant emotional incitement." Tony Huang raised his hand.

"The prosecution's request is established." The black lady nodded: "Attention, defense, this is the closing statement. Please try to provide words that will help determine the value. Continue."

"Yes." The other lawyer, at least on the surface, still did not lose his temper. "Regarding the so-called evidence presented by the prosecution, we still believe that the court should not have accepted it. The other party proposed that the relief sculpture of a general owned by my client is consistent with the style of the remaining Sanyue sculptures and the relief sculpture of a group of dwarf women serving in Wang Chuzhi's tomb. We think that this is totally unacceptable."

"From the images, the warriors are fierce and sturdy, with angry brows and exaggerated shapes, while the women in the statues of Sanyue and the reliefs of the attendants are gentle and soft. The two images are very different and are definitely not of the same style!"

"Also, if the two were from the same tomb, why are the colors on the relief of the attendant blurred, while the image of the warrior is so clear? Even if a child were to identify the two photos, it would be impossible to think that the two statues came from the same place."

"Therefore, I ask the judge and jury to reject the prosecution's unreasonable demands, protect the legitimate rights and interests of my client, and do not let my client not get the justice he did not get in the East and also not get in the West."

Just as Tony Huang was about to protest again, the other party quickly said: "My statement is over, thank you."

Zhou Zhi couldn't help but feel angry. These lawyers were really good at talking. If he were an unrelated jury, he would have felt that what Tony Huang said was pretty much the same before hearing his speech.

If one has some prejudice against China, these remarks may really have a preconceived effect.

Fortunately, Tony Huang had already prepared for this and listed this item as a top priority when selecting the jury. This made Zhou Zhi look at Tony Huang with a higher opinion of him as he was about to stand up.

Damn it, to deal with a lawyer, you really can only rely on a lawyer!

"Your Honor, and the jury, this case, which originated in China but needs to be tried in New York, has attracted a certain amount of attention worldwide. Everyone can make their own subjective judgment based on their own observations. This is the simplest fact and the most basic quality of a jury. I don't think the other party needs to remind me of this point."

Some people in the jury box had already begun to smile. It seemed that Tony Huang's simple words had largely destroyed the other side's attempt to create opposition.

"We have always believed that we need to pursue this case based on the facts of the case, and we have been doing so, working hard to provide the prosecution with all the evidence and information they need until just now."

"Please allow me to refute the other party's two points first." "First, the other party's statement is that the styles of the warrior statues and the images of the serving women are not unified." Tony Huang said: "Here, the other party has replaced a concept and confused style with subject matter, attempting to deceive our respected judge and jury with distorted reasons."

“The images of the warriors, sanraku, and attendant reliefs are indeed different, but this is because of their different functions.”

"The warriors were used to ward off evil spirits, drive away ghosts, and protect their masters, so their shapes were necessarily exaggerated, with frowning and stern expressions."

"The images of Sanyue and other forms of music reflect secular people and scenes of life in song and dance, showing the rich life of the tomb owner. The characters must be portrayed as amiable and amiable, so this difference is reasonable and inevitable;"

"But this is due to the difference in the selection and shaping of the image caused by the subject matter. The similarity in style we are talking about is not here."

"We all know that handwriting identification is an important part of legal evidence collection," Tony Huang explained confidently. "A person's writing style and habits will be reflected in his handwriting. Whether he is copying the Bible respectfully or signing a check casually, the two handwritings are just like the difference between the statues of warriors and the statues of servants we see, but their styles are completely different."

"The chisel of the craftsmen is their pen, and the image they create is their handwriting. If the reliefs are made by the same group of craftsmen, they will inevitably leave the same style characteristics as calligraphy."

"Please look at the comparison of these photos." Tony Huang showed the jury and the black lady a few photos. "Look at these details, the border of the relief, the slope of the support, the crease of the corner of the clothes, the depth of the inner groove edge, can you tell me what the difference is?"

"Let's look at these photos again." Tony Huang showed a few more pictures: "This shows the processing of straight lines and curves. Let's take a look at the groove depth, concave curvature, and ridge features. What are the differences?"

"Now I can tell you." Tony Huang walked to the big whiteboard with pictures of reliefs of military commanders and pictures of servants hanging on it. "Now I can tell you that the details of the relief edges, the corners of clothes, the inner folds, the odd-numbered ones are from the reliefs of military commanders, and the even-numbered ones are from the pictures of servants. They are from here, here, here, and here."

Everyone took the picture and followed the instructions, and indeed found the places that were the same as in the photo. They were surprised to find that the two statues, which seemed to have completely different expressions, had so many similarities in the details.

"From the details of the two statues, we can see that the skilled craftsmen of ancient China were able to present different visual effects for different themes, but the craftsmanship standards they used to express different themes were completely unified. This is why we solemnly declare that the styles of the two are completely unified."

"As for the reason for the huge difference in the surface colors of the two, we know from the archaeological survey report that the Sanyue and Fengshi statues are in the back chamber of the tomb, which was robbed by ancient tomb robbers in the Jin Dynasty, more than a thousand years ago. After that, rainwater flowed into the back chamber of the tomb through the robbed hole for thousands of years, eventually causing this result."

"Luckily but unfortunately, Wang Chuzhi's tomb had a 'fake front room' between the front and back rooms to prevent theft. This fake room had deceived all tomb robbers for thousands of years until it was finally discovered by a group of tomb robbers a few months ago!"

"This warrior relief came from the antechamber which had never been destroyed, so the coloring was preserved so well. This is natural." (End of this chapter)