Ladies and Gentlemen of Leisure

Earlier this year, club owner and entrepreneur Qiao Zhibing invited 36 fellow art collectors from the greater China region to submit works from their private inventories for a group exhibition in Shanghai. Out of these proposals, Qiao handpicked around 50 artworks—of which approximately 40 were by men and fewer than 10 by female artists—for the exhibition, entitled “Art Patrons,” which was on display at the two initiatives he founded in the West Bund Culture Corridor: Qiao Space, and the 60,000-square-meter cultural hub Tank Shanghai. The show opened in late March, catering to the international museum directors, curators, collectors and art professionals who might have stopped in Shanghai on their way to Art Basel Hong Kong.

It was revealing that the exhibition invitation listed all 36 contributing collectors and collections, yet not a single artist was mentioned. The emphasis was clearly on those who had acquired