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I think of art as coming from daily life, daily experience. I think it's very important not to have it become work for some kind of elite circle.

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
Coming
Life
Experience
Art
Become
Elite
Important
Elites
Work
Circle
Kind
Circles
Think
Daily

More quotes by 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.
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I think Allen [Ginsberg] was a person who's like a child.
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No state or society can claim to have established human rights once and for all.
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I came back [to Beijing ] because that's the only time I had an excuse to come back, or otherwise I would never have a reason to come back.
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Freedom of speech implies the world isn’t defined. It is meaningful when people are allowed to see the world their way.
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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.
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We are living in a popular culture where everything is overexposed.
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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.
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Democracy, material wealth, and universal education are the soil upon which modernism exists.
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I think everybody deserves freedom. Freedom is such an abstract word, but it's all we need.
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I have to find a place for my own. I have to search for my own happiness.
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The misconception of totalitarianism is that freedom can be imprisoned. This is not the case. When you constrain freedom, freedom will take flight and land on a windowsill.
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Everyone wants an iPhone, but it would be impossible to design an iPhone in China because it's not a product it's an understanding of human nature.
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Choices after waking up: To be true or to lie? To take action or be brainwashed? To be free or be jailed?
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[Cultural department] understand nothing but bureaucratic daily affairs. They don't care about culture.
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...photographs are facts, but not necessarily true... The present always surpasses the past, and the future will not care about today.
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I hope that my work expresses my worldview and encourages people to exchange ideas.
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I don't believe in the so-called Olympic spirit. I speak from personal experience. When China hosted the Games, it failed to include the people. The event was constructed without regard for their joy.
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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.
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Hopefully, other successes aren't like me. It carries much more meaning to other people my success story is irrelevant. It doesn't make any sense.
Ai Weiwei