Quote

To express yourself needs a reason, but expressing yourself is the reason.

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
Reason
Needs
Expressing
Express

More quotes by 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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You're still being looked at as somebody who - it's a very complicated issue.
Ai Weiwei
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A nation that has no music and no fairytales is a tragedy.
Ai Weiwei
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Today, we jump into this globalization of the economy and the internet age.
Ai Weiwei
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Civilization has evolved toward more acceptance, understanding and tolerance of global thinking. If we accept differences, our creativity booms. It makes life much more colorful. It also makes humanity much more safe. If we see pureness somewhere as something to be desired, the trouble starts.
Ai Weiwei
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I wouldn’t say I’ve become more radical: I was born radical.
Ai Weiwei
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I often feel more disgust than pride about this kind of success. So there's no regret whatsoever.
Ai Weiwei
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If Shakespeare were alive today, he might be writing on Twitter.
Ai Weiwei
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[Cultural departments] don't care about culture. Maybe they're the furthest from the people who understand culture.
Ai Weiwei
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Cities really are mental conditions. Beijing is a nightmare. A constant nightmare.
Ai Weiwei
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I'm not nostalgic about the old city. I don't enjoy it that much. It was just a city with one emperor and the rest of them just rats or meaningless people.
Ai Weiwei
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No state or society can claim to have established human rights once and for all.
Ai Weiwei
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I think Allen [Ginsberg] was a person who's like a child.
Ai Weiwei
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The art always wins. Anything can happen to me, but the art will stay.
Ai Weiwei
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I spent a lot of time standing on street corners [of New York City] talking to local residents. I spent time in bookstores and galleries. But most of the time, I really did not have much to do.
Ai Weiwei
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The motivation is really to say people can find the game of getting involved interesting and find the problem and really have the passion and the enthusiasm to solve it and move forward, but that's all I know.
Ai Weiwei
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I don't think China should care if this crazy old guy should have a show here or not. You have so many museums in the West, and so many shows, you need somebody to show the work, otherwise it's empty.
Ai Weiwei
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The Internet has established a public sphere and developed a pressure which the government can no longer ignore.
Ai Weiwei
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The freedom of speech is an important yardstick for a society's level of civilization.
Ai Weiwei
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My image of what a city should be - the super-rich and all the poor and desperate and the people who have some kind of a desire. It's a surviving game, people trying to survive on many different levels.
Ai Weiwei