He's famous but doesn't want to bignote himself

THE man with one of the most famous faces in China has emerged from a shroud of secrecy after 60 years to reveal his identity.

Millions would be familiar with Yang Qi's face - he posed as the handsome worker on the 10-yuan banknote in 1948 - but very few knew who he was.

Eighty-three-year-old Yang's secret was uncovered when the Caohejing neighborhood committee government, in Xuhui District, set up an archive.

Issued in December 1948, the cyan-colored 10-yuan banknote features the image of a worker carrying a hammer standing shoulder to shoulder with a hoe-wielding farmer.

In early 1948, the central bank president approached Yang, a banknote designer, and his colleague at the North China Banknote Printing Factory.

The pair were given the task of designing and printing a new set of banknotes.

"The banknote design was required to reflect the country's booming agricultural and industrial development in the upcoming People's Republic of China," Yang told Shanghai Daily yesterday. "The images of worker and farmer stood out to become the final choice."

For security reasons, the banknote's design and printing process were top secret which made it difficult for the factory to use professional models, Yang recalled.

With a powerful physique and rugged good looks, Yang was chosen as a model for the worker image, and his colleague, from a rural family, assumed the role of farmer.

As a backdrop, the factory rented a small house in a rural village of Shandong Province. Yang then donned a worker's uniform and posed with a hammer while his colleague wore a bamboo hat and stood proudly with a hoe.

A professional painter was commissioned to draw the portrait which took six days. No cameras were available at that time, Yang said.

The first set of renminbi banknotes was completed in autumn, 1948. But Yang, who was transferred to work in the public security bureau, didn't reveal his story to anyone.

"Even my family members didn't know for a long time," Yang said.

He said it was not until he wrote a personal memoir in the late 1980s that he came clean. But his writings weren't made public until it was uncovered in the archive.