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If a nation cannot face its past, it has no future.

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
Nation
Nations
Face
Faces
Future
Cannot
Past

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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For artists and intellectuals today, what is most needed is to be clear about social responsibility, because that is what most people automatically give up. Just to protect yourself as an individual is very political. You don't have to march on Tiananmen, but you do have to be clear-minded, to find your own means of expression.
Ai Weiwei
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A city is a place that can offer maximum freedom. Otherwise it’s incomplete.
Ai Weiwei
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I lived there [ in New York City] as an artist, but never as a Chinese artist.
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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You need a purpose to express yourself, but that expression is its own purpose.
Ai Weiwei
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Art needs to stand for something.
Ai Weiwei
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Man has a tendency to try to give clear reasons to be rational, but often you can see how all those reasons are not convincing and turn out to be a big nonsense.
Ai Weiwei
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The Internet changes the structure of society all the time — this massiveness made of individuals.
Ai Weiwei
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New York is a city where you're so alone, you're an individual, you can disappear. You can make something happen. But it's very different to make something happen in the art world.
Ai Weiwei
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[Being unique] gives so much privilege to people who can make it, rather than having some moral and aesthetic discussions.
Ai Weiwei
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We see the tendency in the world to criticise democracy and sometimes even to say that authoritarian countries like China are more efficient. That is very short-sighted. China looks efficient only because it can sacrifice most people's rights. This is not something the west should be happy about.
Ai Weiwei
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My definition of art has always been the same. It is about freedom of expression. I don’t think anybody can separate art from politics. The intention to separate [the two] is itself a very political intention.
Ai Weiwei
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It's really rubbish that some kind of technical learning means you will be a better person because you know this skill better.
Ai Weiwei
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Warhol influenced me because of his writing. If I had never read his writings and interviews, I would never have understood his work.
Ai Weiwei
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The society was so different [in China] - it was a feudalistic society. It didn't come to a point of industrial revolution until twenty years ago.
Ai Weiwei
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That's why I always question this sense. The feeling of home really requires a lot of trust. It requires you to identify with it, which I always find myself very contradictory to.
Ai Weiwei
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My childhood was quite extreme. Sometimes I was so weak I could not stand up. But now I am so strong. Life is unpredictable
Ai Weiwei
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Even though everybody who looked at me would call me a Chinese artist, that's the 1980s. New York in the '80s was not so interesting. I think it's quite narrow-minded. There wasn't much encouragement or opportunities for any artist - not just Chinese artists.
Ai Weiwei
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When human beings are scared and feel everything is exposed to the government, we will censor ourselves from free thinking. That's dangerous for human development.
Ai Weiwei
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Any design, any city, any kind of craziness or tragedy, it all comes from a long time of preparation.
Ai Weiwei