CARACAS -
As tear gas chokes the air and water cannons gush in the streets, a skinny young man wearing the red, blue and yellow of Venezuela's flag stands bravely amid the chaos and plays the violin.
That is 23-year-old Wuilly Arteaga doing his bit -- contributing music to the nearly daily street rallies rocking the country as the opposition tries to force President Nicolas Maduro from power.
Arteaga, who was badly injured in the face Saturday at a demonstration, has become a sort of fixture at the rallies -- a powerful symbol of everyday people's anger with a leader they blame for a severe economic crisis.
As bedlam erupts around him, Arteaga stands and plays the national anthem or traditional Venezuelan music.
Big time performers abroad like pop star Shakira have taken notice and expressed support for Arteaga.
On Saturday, Arteaga was seen with blood pouring from cuts on the left side of his face. He said later he had been struck with buckshot.
"They are not going to frighten me," Arteaga said in a video he posted on Twitter from a hospital bed, with big swollen lips and bandages on his face. "We are going to keep fighting."
Then he picked up his violin and played a little. On social media, people went nuts with praise for him.
- 'I know I am nobody' -
The musician became an icon of the protest movement on May 8 when he was pictured calmly weaving through tear gas with his violin on his shoulder, playing a classic Venezuelan folk song called "Alma Llanera."
Immortalized in photographs from that performance, he said he meant it as a message of peace.
Arteaga learned to play with an award-winning Venezuelan network of youth orchestras created for kids from underprivileged areas.
Arteaga shot to fame when he performed at the funeral of an 18-year-old musician, Armando Canizales, who died of a gunshot wound May 3 at a protest rally in Caracas.
"I was very afraid because I thought not even music had the power to make people stop and think. But I left the cemetery and went to the protest with even more strength," he told AFP.
Since then Arteaga is often seen playing at protest rallies. Four months of them have degenerated into violence that has left 103 people dead.
Arteaga used to make a living playing in the street for donations, although he has traveled to Europe seven times with the youth orchestra organization.
He cried openly when a soldier broke his violin during a protest march on May 24.
Video and photos of that incident triggered an outpouring of sympathy on social media and people chipped in money so he could buy another instrument.
With his taste of fame, Arteaga's life has changed. At the invitation of non-governmental organizations he traveled to the United States to show off his talent and visited the headquarters of the United Nations.
"I know I am nobody," he said during that trip. But he added, "I will do whatever it takes for Venezuelans like me to be able to live in our country in peace."
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