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What counts in the end is what the government does.

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
Counts
Ends
Doe
Government

More quotes by Ai Weiwei

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I think I'm just a traveler. When you walk across a river and there's no bridge, you build one. I'm used to having to deal with Chinese Communist ideology - it's not really an ideology, but a method of control. But China's problems are not just China's problems - they're human problems. Humanity has always worked better when you see it as one.
Ai Weiwei
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Otherwise, I think the building can be bigger, larger, and the city can be much more crazy. The problem is the government structure is so deadly stupid, not really solving problems but creating a lot of problems itself every day.
Ai Weiwei
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Of course, people will call you an old artist or young artist, which is just a character of you. But personally, I don't think my work and my understanding of art is so much related to being Chinese, but the character of that. Maybe it's beyond my own consciousness.
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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If a society cannot even support somebody like me, then people ask: Who is under protection then? That's why there is such support for me. It is not because I am so beautiful or I am so charming. People feel: This guy is fighting for us.
Ai Weiwei
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China partially wants to become part of the world. By hosting the Olympics and the Expo, they made a big effort to tell people: Look, we are the same. They want to be accepted by the international community.
Ai Weiwei
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I always want to design a frame that’s open to everyone. I don’t see art as a secret code.
Ai Weiwei
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I have to respect my life, and free expression is part of my life. I can never really silence myself.
Ai Weiwei
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We grew up in a very material-lacking socialist society, but today China is a capitalist society. It's very materialistic. It's full of desire and luxury goods.
Ai Weiwei
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I never regret anything.
Ai Weiwei
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If there's the right condition, I always want to express the concept or ideas in a very independent way.
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.
Ai Weiwei
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I always want people to be confused, to be shocked or realize something later.
Ai Weiwei
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This is a very general understanding of art in China, that being an artist can make you money and turn you into a star.
Ai Weiwei
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I don't think there is a distinct change, because in the West I'm not a person who can serve his purpose.
Ai Weiwei
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In a society that restricts individual freedoms and violates human rights, anything that calls itself creative or independent is a pretence. It is impossible for a totalitarian society to create anything with passion and imagination.
Ai Weiwei
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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.
Ai Weiwei
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I don't think I was very structured in that society and I don't really believe in personal success, which most Americans believe in.
Ai Weiwei
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I spent a lot of time standing on street corners [of New York City] talking to local residents. I spent time in bookstores and galleries. But most of the time, I really did not have much to do.
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