On the eve of China’s grand military parade, an activist in a city with 30 million people staged a protest that doubled as performance art, proof that defiance can still surface, and survive, even in one of the world’s most surveilled states.

在中国举行盛大阅兵前夕，一名活动人士在一个人口3000万的城市进行了一场兼具抗议与行为艺术的活动，证明了即使在世界上监控最严密的国家之一，反抗依然可以出现并得以存续。

At 10 p.m. on Friday in Chongqing, a large projection on a building lit up the night with slogans calling for the end of Communist Party rule. “Only without the Communist Party can there be a new China,” read one. Another declared: “No more lies, we want the truth. No more slavery, we want freedom.”

上周五晚上10点，重庆一栋建筑上的巨大投影点亮了夜空，显示着要求结束共产党统治的标语。其中一条写着“没有共产党才有新中国。”另一条宣称：“不要谎言要真相，不要奴役要自由。”

It took the police 50 minutes to locate where the projection was coming from — a hotel nearby — and shut it down. That’s usually the end of such protests in China. But not in this case. A few hours later, the activist released video footage of five police officers entering the hotel room, rushing to the window and finding the projector hidden behind a half-closed curtain. While four of them were fiddling to shut it down, another officer pointed with surprise to a surveillance camera aimed at them.

警方花了50分钟才找到投影来源——附近的一家酒店——并将其关闭。在中国，此类抗议通常到此为止。但这次并非如此。几个小时后，这名活动人士发布了一段视频，显示五名警察进入酒店房间，冲到窗前，发现投影仪藏在半掩的窗帘后面。四名警察忙着关闭设备时，另一名警察惊讶地指着对准他们的监控摄像头。

A handwritten letter addressed to the police was on the coffee table: “Even if you are a beneficiary of the system today, one day you will inevitably become a victim on this land,” said the letter, which the activist also circulated online. “So please treat the people with kindness.”

茶几上有一封写给警方的手书：“也许你现在是受益人，但在这片土地上有一天你一定是受害者。”这名活动人士将这封信发到了网上。“请在能力范围内善待他人。”

The next day, the man who staged the incident, Qi Hong, published another image from surveillance footage showing police officers questioning his frail, hunched mother in front of her village home.

第二天，策划此事件的戚洪发布了一张监控画面，显示警察在他家的村屋门前盘问他年老体弱、佝偻的母亲。

The act was both a protest and a performance, documented in real time. The protest, staged through light and cameras, turned the state’s gaze back on itself. The visuals, when put together, had the look of performance art mocking the Communist Party security apparatus.

这一行为既是抗议，也是表演，并被实时记录了下来。通过投影和摄像头进行的抗议将凝视的目光调转，使国家成为了被审视的对象。这些视觉资料组合在一起，宛如嘲弄共产党安全机构的行为艺术。

By the time the police arrived, Mr. Qi had already left China nine days earlier with his wife and daughters. He had turned on the projection and recorded the police’s response from a remote location in Britain.

当警察到达时，戚洪已于九天前带着妻子和女儿离开了中国。他在英国远程开启了投影，并记录下警方的反应。

Technology has strengthened the Chinese government’s ability to control its people. Mr. Qi illustrated how the same tools can enable resistance.

技术强化了中国政府控制人民的能力。戚洪展示了同样的工具也能实现抵抗。

“Qi Hong outwitted the police, outmaneuvered the state machinery — and there was little they could do about it,” said Li Ying, who runs perhaps the most influential Chinese-language X account and often posts protest footage. “It was incredibly cool.”

“戚洪智胜警方，巧妙地规避了国家机器——他们对此束手无策，”运营着X平台上可能最具影响力的中文账号，并经常发布抗议视频的李颖表示，“简直太酷了。”

Mr. Li called the act “a serious blow” to the authorities who had poured enormous resources into ensuring stability ahead of the parade on Wednesday. “His action showed that the C.C.P.’s control isn’t airtight. It’s not like we can’t do anything,” he said.

李颖称此举是对当局的“沉重打击”——为保障周三阅兵前不出事，当局投入了巨大资源维稳。“他的行动表明，中共的控制并非天衣无缝。我们并非什么都做不了，”他说。

The videos, circulated through the social media accounts of Mr. Li and others, reached an unusually large audience. One post of the projected slogans drew more than 18 million views in four days.

通过李颖和其他人的社交媒体账号传播的这些视频获得了规模异常庞大的受众。其中一条关于这次投影标语的帖子在四天内获得了超过1800万次的观看数量。

Mr. Qi said he had never thought of his act as art or even bravery.

戚洪说，他从未想过自己的行为是艺术，甚至是勇敢行为。

“My only intention was to express myself,” he told me in his first media interview. “The party installs surveillance cameras to watch us. I thought I could use the same method to watch them.”

“我唯一的意图是表达自己，”他在首次接受媒体采访时告诉我。“党安装监控摄像头来监视我们。我想我也可以用同样的方法来监视他们。”

Many people online called him a hero and offered their thanks. Some commenters said Mr. Qi’s ingenuity in using technology had inspired them.

许多网民称他为英雄并表达感谢。一些评论者说，戚洪在运用科技手段的独创性启发了他们。

Mr. Qi himself is a copycat. Like other protesters, he drew inspiration from Peng Lifa, the man who in October 2022 unfurled banners on a busy Beijing overpass calling for China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, to step down. Mr. Peng, soon tagged “Bridge Man” in a nod to “Tank Man” of the 1989 Tiananmen protests, was quickly seized by the police and has not been heard from.

戚洪的做法也并非独创。和其他抗议者一样，他受到彭立发的启发。2022年10月，彭立发在北京一座繁忙的立交桥上拉起横幅，呼吁中国最高领导人习近平下台。他很快被警方逮捕，此后音讯全无。很快他就被冠以“桥人”的称号，这是对1989年天安门抗议中“坦克人”的呼应。

The copycat effect may be the biggest headache for the Chinese government. The country’s economy is experiencing a yearslong slowdown, and many college graduates, migrant workers and professionals are struggling to find jobs. Mr. Li, the blogger, said many more people were sending him protest footage this year than in the prior two years.

对中国政府来说，模仿效应或许才是最让其头痛之处。中国经济正经历长达数年的放缓，许多大学毕业生、农民工和专业人士都在为找工作发愁。博主李颖表示，今年向他发送抗议视频的人比前两年多得多。

Mr. Qi insists he is not courageous. Soft-spoken, he said he felt compelled to share what he thinks and to urge more Chinese people to see what he called the brutality and absurdity of the Communist Party’s rule.

戚洪坚称自己并不勇敢。他轻声细语地说，他觉得有必要分享自己的想法，并敦促更多中国人看清他所说的共产党统治的残酷和荒谬。

Born in 1982 in a mountain village near Chongqing, Mr. Qi grew up in poverty. At 16, he dropped out of school and joined the tide of migrant workers seeking work in China’s booming cities. But without the temporary residence permits required at the time, he said, he was detained and beaten by police officers in Guangdong and Beijing, once for over 20 days. The experience, he said, persuaded him to avoid the authorities at all costs.

戚洪1982年出生于重庆附近的一个山村，在贫困中长大。16岁时，他辍学加入了涌向中国繁荣城市寻找工作的农民工大军。但他说，由于当时没有所需的暂住证，他曾在广东和北京多次遭警察拘留、殴打，其中一次长达20多天。他说，这段经历让他下定决心不惜一切代价避开当局。

He cycled through jobs working in factories, sanitation and sales. In 2006, his fortune turned when he started selling inexpensive items online on Taobao. Within a few years, he married and bought a modest apartment in Beijing.

他先后在工厂、环卫和销售等行业工作。2006年，他开始在淘宝上销售廉价商品，命运由此出现转机。几年的时间，他结婚并在北京买下了一套不大的公寓。

But in 2013, restless and drawn to Buddhism, he shut down the online shop, moved his family to a village outside Beijing and ran a small package pickup station. By 2021, with their eldest daughter about to enter middle school, the family returned to Chongqing.

但在2013年，由于心绪不安并受到佛教吸引，他关闭了网店，带着家人搬到北京郊外的一个村庄，经营一个小快递代收点。到2021年，随着大女儿即将进入初中，一家人回到了重庆。

There, Mr. Qi worked as an electrician and grew more politically aware. He bristled at the propaganda in his daughters’ textbooks, the government’s stoking of nationalism and the suppression of free speech. “I was dissatisfied with the government, but I didn’t dare to speak out,” he said.

在那里，戚洪做了一名电工，政治意识也日益增强。他对女儿教科书中的宣传、政府煽动民族主义和压制言论自由感到愤怒。“我对政府不满，但不敢说出来，”他说。

He turned to books for answers. He read “1984,” “Animal Farm” and “Brave New World.” “I was terrified that they’re still ruling us the same way,” he said.

他转而从阅读中寻找答案。他读了《1984》、《动物农场》和《美丽新世界》。“让我恐惧的是，他们至今仍用同样的方式统治我们，”他说。

His WeChat posts became more pointed. On the 33rd anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre in 2022, he wrote: “The pursuit of light is something every thinking human should strive for. Light of wisdom, light of civilization, light of humanity, light of democracy.” His New Year wish for 2024 was simple: “May everyone have freedom from fear.”

他在微信的发帖变得更加尖锐。在2022年天安门大屠杀33周年之际，他写道：“追求光明是每个有思想的人都应该努力去做的事情。智慧之光，文明之光，人性之光，民主之光。”他对2024年的新年愿望很简单：“愿每个人都免于恐惧。”

In May, he posted what he assumed would get his WeChat account deleted, “We want democracy, not dictatorship!” Nothing happened. But for him, the words were a turning point.

今年5月，他发了一条自己以为一定会导致微信号被封的帖子：“我们要民主，不要独裁！”然而什么也没发生。但对他来说，这些话是一个转折点。

By July, with news of Mr. Xi’s planned military parade, Mr. Qi decided it was time.

到7月，随着习近平计划阅兵的消息传出，戚洪决定，是时候行动了。

He surveyed locations and chose a busy section of Chongqing’s university area. On Aug. 10, he checked into a hotel, spent 10 days practicing laser projection on a nearby high-rise and prepared the slogans he would beam into the night sky. To test, he beamed harmless phrases like “be healthy” and “be happy.” Then he and his family left China.

他考察了多个地点，最后选择了重庆大学区的一个繁华地段。8月10日，他入住一家酒店，用了10天时间在附近的一栋高楼上练习激光投影，并准备好要投射到夜空中的标语。为了测试，他先投射了“身体健康”“开心快乐”之类的无害词句。然后，他带着家人离开了中国。

On Aug. 29, he switched on the projector remotely. He clipped together footage of the slogans and the police raid, shared them with influential people online like Mr. Li and watched as they spread across the internet.

8月29日，他远程开启了投影仪。他将标语和警察搜查的视频剪辑在一起，分享给李颖等有影响力的网络人士，随后看到它们在互联网上迅速传播开来。

The state struck back. The police detained one of his brothers and a friend, and interrogated his mother outside her home. He had told no one about his plans except his wife and daughters. The Chongqing police did not respond to my request for comment.

政府进行了反击。警方拘留了他的一个兄弟和一位朋友，并在他母亲家门外审问她。除了妻女，他没有把计划告诉任何人。重庆警方没有回应我的置评请求。

Mr. Qi says he’s stunned by the reactions online and is unsure of what lies ahead.

戚洪说，网络上的反应让他感到震惊，他也不确定未来会发生什么。