A Chinese Millionaire and Prominent Gadfly of the Communist Party Has Vanished After Staging an Art Performance Criticizing Xi Jinping

Ren Zhiqiang, a Beijing-based
real estate tycoon and vocal critic of his country’s government,
has been missing since March 12, stoking widespread speculation
that he was silenced by China’s government. 

One of the last things he did
before disappearing was debut a performance artwork that critiqued
the country’s authoritarian censorship policies.

Ren, 69, rose to prominence in
the late 1980s and early ’90s working for, and eventually running,
a real estate investment company. His success in the field and
outspoken nature has drawn him numerous comparisons with Donald
Trump, and earned him the nickname “the Cannon.” 

Though he is a well-connected
member of the Communist Party, Ren frequently made headlines for
his public critiques of the government under Chinese President Xi
Jinping.

In 2016, after Ren criticized Xi
in a Weibo blog post, his social media accounts were closed and
he was placed on a
one-year party probation, leaving open the possibility of his
expulsion.

Earlier this year, responding to
a February 23 speech given by Xi, Ren wrote: “I saw not an emperor
standing there exhibiting his ‘new clothes,’ but a clown who
stripped naked and insisted on continuing being
emperor.”

“Despite holding a series of
loincloths up in an attempt to cover the reality of your
nakedness,” he continued, “you don’t in the slightest hide your
resolute ambition to be an emperor, or the determination to let
anyone who won’t let you be destroyed.”

Earlier this month, Ren
circulated a scathing
essay in which he
castigated the Chinese government’s handling of the coronavirus
pandemic and again called Xi a power-hungry
“clown.” Weeks later,
his friends reported him missing, and no one has heard from him
since. 

Last December, Ren, who has
picked up art since his retirement, opened an exhibition of his
wooden sculptures and wall reliefs at a venue in Beijing’s 798
Art Center. For the opening, he holed himself up inside a cramped
workspace in the gallery, letting visitors watch him through a
small window.

The idea, he told friends at the
time, was to demonstrate how the government’s infringement had left
him isolated from the rest of the world, according to the
New York
Times. 

Elsewhere in the
gallery, Ren’s wooden sculptures sat atop acrylic plinths and
each one depicted an abstracted landscape. Ren said the scenes were
culled from his dreams and signified how humankind had shaped the
environment.

The post A Chinese Millionaire and Prominent Gadfly of the
Communist Party Has Vanished After Staging an Art Performance
Criticizing Xi Jinping appeared first on artnet
News.