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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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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
City
Rest
Cities
Enjoy
Much
Nostalgic
People
Emperor
Rats
Meaningless

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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Modern Chinese culture is weak and lackluster.
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All the auction houses care about is the selling of luxury goods.
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For all the tough talk about China during the presidential debates, Romney and Obama evaded any mention of China's suspect human rights record, corruption, and rule of law. By not tackling these controversial topics, the candidates are protecting a strategic partnership with China at the expense of essential human values and beliefs.
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Maybe [success] is because I'm in China and I'm more open. Maybe it's my independent behavior, or because I participated in certain projects. I have no idea.
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The people who control culture in China have no culture.
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I never saw [Allen Ginsberg] as some kind of crazy figure.
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We move so fast that memory is something we can only grasp
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Recently I danced in a video spoof of the song 'Gangnam Style,' and it was quickly banned across multiple Chinese online video platforms. But the story still traveled all over the world, carried in hundreds of international media reports.
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If artists cannot speak up for human dignity or rights, then who else will do it?
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Liberty is about our rights to question everything.
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To express yourself needs a reason, but expressing yourself is the reason.
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Historically, China is not a nation of sportsmen. We traditionally put more emphasis on being close to nature than pushing endlessly to excel. A philosophy that values tranquil contemplation of the landscape cannot easily be adapted to the Olympic slogan of 'higher, stronger, faster.'
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Creativity is the power to act.
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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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Democracy, material wealth, and universal education are the soil upon which modernism exists.
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Artists are the worst [people]. They are selfish, self-centred they don't care what happens.
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Today, the general masses in this society are in this political-social condition that really encourages people to become rich and become a star and be unique.
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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.
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I think my stance and my way of life is my most important art.
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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.
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