.
It is easy to miss him, hidden away at his usual seat in a quiet corner of the restaurant, but Richard Chen Lin's is a familiar face at the Ambassy Club in Shanghai. The son of late painter-cum-businessman Chen Yifei is tucking into a plate of barbecued pork rice. Wearing a pink checked shirt, shiny leather shoes and silver-rimmed glasses, the 32-year-old, American-educated entrepreneur is amiable, confident and chatty, as was his father, who passed away in April. His death was not wholly surprising, says Richard, given the stress associated with the elder Chen's final project; one he did not manage to complete.
Unlike his father, however, Richard is not an artistic type. Shanghai high society and the mainland's art world had expected a smooth transition, with the eldest son stepping into his father's shoes to helm multimillion-dollar cultural empire the Yifei Group - but this son has different ideas.
Yifei's managing director, who joined the group as chief financial officer in 2000 and was instrumental in bringing on board the influential Tatler magazine, wants to move in a new direction and is not interested in building on his father's legacy. He says he would happily hand over the group's core business operations to his stepmother, Song Meiying.
'I'm more an investment person,' he says between mouthfuls. 'I would like to prove to my father that you don't need to spend a dime to make any money. Two to three years ago, I started to branch out from Yifei. I can do a lot more with my business.'
Chen senior shot to fame as one of the first Chinese artists to exhibit paintings in the west and later, with the establishment of the Yifei Group, became a style guru. The group produces and imports modern home and fashion collections, magazines and books on culture, and incorporates a modelling agency and film projects. Chen was also one of the founders of pioneering lifestyle magazine Vision in 2002.