Chen is a performance artist and blogger. On March 25, 2021, he was detained by Chengdu authorities on charges of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” after he published an online article criticizing the state of schools in Sichuan. In December 2021, he was convicted on retaliatory charges of “child molestation” and sentenced to four years in prison. Chen has a history of arrests, he was previously detained in 2019 for his online commentary.
