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Somehow, we [ Tan Dun and director Chen Kaige] were all privileged at the time we could be outside of China. But at the moment, we had no sense of what the future was going to be like.

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
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China
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Somehow

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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I think U.S. and China is a big opportunity, to be seen as partner or some kind of strategic partner maybe. But those kind of powers have a way of getting too big, then we'll have competition. And who is going to win the competition if U.S. cannot hold a strong ideology? And even the U.S. would've lost the ground to win.
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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.
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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.
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I never had a sense of home.
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If it's possible, I will have some noodles in the morning and start talking to people, start to think about a few things in my head - the project or a few ideas which are not finished or if there are possible directions and what will lead into another game. It's always like setting up some kind of game you can continuously play.
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There are many cases and layers of racist behavior in the US - from police treatment to the issues of education and job opportunities. In America, however, such cases are being discussed publically.
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Art needs to stand for something.
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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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Of course, most luxury goods in China are for corrupted officials and their relatives. And that made China become the biggest luxury-goods market. In this kind of dictatorship, in this kind of totalitarian society, it is easy to make deals that you cannot make in a democratic society.
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I think you can give meaning to any condition you can be poor or unsuccessful or be so-called successful. But I don't think that it would give an individual human being a better condition.
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Even if there have been setbacks during these past years, China is changing. China's society is opening.
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If people are being abused or even killed during an arrest, this is highly disturbing.
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If you don’t act, the danger becomes stronger.
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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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Being an artist is more of a mindset, a way of seeing things it is no longer so much about producing something.
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New York has given me a lot, but I still don't consider it home.
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The whole Chinese system - not just the political leadership, the military too, the whole power structure, our education system, the whole of society - is suffering from being cut off from the free flow of information. That's why the country can't face up to open competition - unless it resorts to measures like North Korea.
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Widespread state control over art and culture has left no room for freedom of expression in the country. For more than 60 years, anyone with a dissenting opinion has been suppressed. Chinese art is merely a product: it avoids any meaningful engagement. There is no larger context. Its only purpose is to charm viewers with its ambiguity.
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Democracy, material wealth, and universal education are the soil upon which modernism exists.
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Creativity is the power to reject the past, to change the status quo, and to seek new potential. Simply put, aside from using one's imagination - perhaps more importantly - creativity is the power to act.
Ai Weiwei