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I think it’s a responsibility for any artist to protect freedom of expression and to use any way to extend this power.

Ai Weiwei

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Ai Weiwei
Age: 67
Born: 1957
Born: May 18
Architect
Consultant
Contemporary Artist
Designer
Film Director
Human Rights Activist
Painter
Photographer
Sculptor
Social Activist
Peking
Wei-wei Ai
Weiwei Ai
Ai Wei Wei
Thinking
Expression
Responsibility
Freedom
Use
Artist
Power
Way
Extend
Think
Protect

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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Of course, people will call you an old artist or young artist, which is just a character of you. But personally, I don't think my work and my understanding of art is so much related to being Chinese, but the character of that. Maybe it's beyond my own consciousness.
Ai Weiwei
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New York has given me a lot, but I still don't consider it home.
Ai Weiwei
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Recently I danced in a video spoof of the song 'Gangnam Style,' and it was quickly banned across multiple Chinese online video platforms. But the story still traveled all over the world, carried in hundreds of international media reports.
Ai Weiwei
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The relationship between the Chinese government and me is like a Cold War.
Ai Weiwei
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To survive, China had to open up to the West. It could not survive otherwise. This was after many millions have died of hunger in a country that was like North Korea is today. Once we became part of global competition, we had to agree to some rules. It's painful, but we had to. Otherwise there was no way to survive.
Ai Weiwei
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I don't think it's worth discussing new directions in the context of Chinese art - there were no old directions, either. Chinese art has never had any clear orientation.
Ai Weiwei
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Selling high or low doesn't mean anything. It has to do purely with the market.
Ai Weiwei
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My situation gives me certain ideas about beauty or the excitement of life, but that doesn't mean other people can necessarily appreciate it.
Ai Weiwei
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Art is always about overcoming obstacles between the inner condition and the skill for expression.
Ai Weiwei
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I never really read Allen Ginsberg poetry, even though I have a book he gave me.
Ai Weiwei
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Now many enterprises are made by individuals, so the attitude has started to change.
Ai Weiwei
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So-called Chinese art and culture is under control of the Party. They exist to serve the official agenda. I call it fake art and culture.
Ai Weiwei
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Expressing oneself is like a drug. I'm so addicted to it.
Ai Weiwei
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Many people I know - writers, poets - they have all been sentenced not once but sometimes three times after they come out. They serve five or six years, come out another time, and then nine years. Come out again, 12 years. Only because they have a different opinion. They are innocent people, they have beautiful minds, beautiful hearts.
Ai Weiwei
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A nation that has no music and no fairytales is a tragedy.
Ai Weiwei
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China is an old nation with a colourful history. Its booming economy has triggered an appetite and a curiosity around the world for its art and culture, one that continues to grow. I can, however, tell people that it is a show with no actor.
Ai Weiwei
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I think art certainly is the vehicle for us to develop any new ideas, to be creative, to extend our imagination, to change the current conditions.
Ai Weiwei
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If you just turn to your paper or television each day, there are thousands of stories that are much more shocking than the gallery artworks.
Ai Weiwei
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I never saw [Allen Ginsberg] as some kind of crazy figure.
Ai Weiwei
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In a society that restricts individual freedoms and violates human rights, anything that calls itself creative or independent is a pretence. It is impossible for a totalitarian society to create anything with passion and imagination.
Ai Weiwei