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China's culture and history are closely related to my living environment. This country is my birthplace. It is also where I grew up. Its culture and history shape my relations with family, friends, society, and daily life.

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
Also
Grew
Closely
Country
Environment
Relations
Life
Friends
Related
Society
Shape
Family
Daily
Living
Relation
History
China
Culture
Shapes
Birthplace

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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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.
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Destroy or build. Crazy or noncrazy. I'm not nostalgic about the old city. I don't enjoy it that much.
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Maybe being powerful means to be fragile.
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Our lives are bound by physical limits, familial ties, political conditions, and geographical restrictions. Individual freedom takes us beyond them all.
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I think art is a very important weapon to achieve human freedom
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A nation like China has become one of the biggest production fields for exporting cheap labor, which also re-questions our history and past, re-questions human desire, and the human illusions of the past.
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I remember one little rainy day I went searching for this apartment and I saw so many people standing on a stoop on the corner in the rain. Later I realized, that was drug traffic. They were all buying drugs.
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If people are being abused or even killed during an arrest, this is highly disturbing.
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I think it's more important to show your work to the public.
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I think by shattering it we can create a new form, a new way to look at what is valuable — how we decide what is valuable.
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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.
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The purpose of art is the fight for freedom.
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I am very much interested in the so-called useless object. I mean, it takes perfect craftsmanship, beautiful material carefully measured and crafted, but at the same time it’s really useless.
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Every day I'm learning something new from the practice. It's very rewarding.
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The American experience influenced my understanding of individuality, basic human rights, freedom of expression and the rights and responsibilities of citizens.
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Creativity is the power to act.
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Creativity is part of human nature. It can only be untaught.
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Art needs to stand for something.
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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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After I came back [to China], there was still a long period of time when I felt I had nothing to do.
Ai Weiwei