VANS SNEAKERS TAKES A KNEE FOR CHINA: ‘It was really unfair,’ Toronto teen says after her Hong Kong-themed shoe removed from contest.
A Toronto teen is finding out just how controversial making an artistic statement about the unrest in Hong Kong can be: her shoe design garnered hundreds of thousands of votes, but suddenly disappeared from an online contest.
Naomi So’s family has roots in the former British colony that the 17-year-old has visited several times, so she decided to create a Hong Kong-themed shoe for the Custom Culture design contest held by Vans — an American manufacturer of skateboarding and other footwear and apparel.
“My mom and dad have been keeping up with the Hong Kong news, and from that I became interested and researched more on what was happening,” she told CBC Toronto.
Naomi, whose family asked that CBC News not show her face or reveal the location of her school, found out that pro-democracy demonstrators have been protesting in the streets for months in sometimes violent clashes with police. She also learned it all started with a bill that would allow people accused of crimes to be extradited to mainland China.
Using ink as her medium, the shoe is mostly black and yellow — the colours worn by protesters. The design also includes a red Bauhinia flower, Hong Kong’s floral emblem.
* * * * * * * *
Vans released a statement on Facebook about the decision to remove “a small number of artistic submissions” based on the global competition’s guidelines. It’s been met with a flurry of comments on social media.
“As a brand that is open to everyone, we have never taken a political position and therefore review designs to ensure they are in line with our company’s long-held values of respect and tolerance, as well as with our clearly communicated guidelines for this competition,” the statement reads.
Related: “The brothers, Paul Van Doren and James Van Doren, started The Van Doren Rubber Company in 1966. Over the next 40 years, they opened factories in California and later contracted factories in China and Vietnam to make the classic Vans vulcanized shoes.”