Rent Collection Courtyard

The Rent Collection Courtyard (Chinese: 收租院; pinyin: shōuzū yuàn) is a clay collection of 114 life-sized sculptures in located in the courtyard of the former home of rural landlord Liu Wencai in Dayi County, Sichuan created by Ye Yushan and a team of sculptors from the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts in 1965. It is a famous work of Socialist Realist sculpture showing an evil landlord collecting rent from poor peasants.^[1] Widely reproduced in various other media, including posters, comic strips, and film, Rent Collection Courtyard was promoted as an example of revolutionary realism and was a key precursor to the artistic movements of the Cultural Revolution.^[2]: 326 Copies were made and put on display in Beijing after modification to make them more powerful as works of propaganda.^[3]

In the 1999 Venice Biennale, the contemporary Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang referenced the sculpture in the performance piece Venice's Rent Collection Courtyard in which he hired artisans to recreate the sculpture.^{[4][5][2]: 326}