{"id":3387,"date":"2020-12-04T09:29:49","date_gmt":"2020-12-04T09:29:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/doerlife.com\/?p=3317"},"modified":"2020-12-04T10:21:20","modified_gmt":"2020-12-04T10:21:20","slug":"the-journey-of-the-most-controversial-chinese-artist-and-activist-ai-weiwei","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebglory.com\/doerlife.com\/the-journey-of-the-most-controversial-chinese-artist-and-activist-ai-weiwei\/","title":{"rendered":"The journey of the most controversial Chinese Artist and Activist – Ai Weiwei"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ai Weiwei the world-famous Chinese activist, artist, architect, photographer, filmmaker, social critic, and blogger is renowned for making strong political statements through a wide range of artistic mediums. He has used art forms like photography, sculpture, installation art, ceramic art, and film in \u2018excessivism\u2019 to voice and openly criticize the Chinese Government’s stand on democracy, human rights, and social values. Born in Beijing in 1957 and currently residing in Cambridge UK, Ai is the most prominent and controversial contemporary artist and cultural figure who introduced the world to China\u2019s artistic heritage. His famous work includes the Sunflower Seeds (2010) exhibit at the Tate Modern, where he depicted the curse of mass consumption and the loss of individuality<\/em> by scattering 100 million porcelain \u201cseeds\u201d hand-painted by 1,600 Chinese artisans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Growing up in China<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Ai, was born on August 28, 1957. In 1958, the family was exiled since Ai’s father Ai Qing, the Chinese poet was a rightist. From 1958 to 1961 they lived in the labor camp at Beidahuang, Heilongjiang in north-eastern China and from 1961 to 1976 were exiled to Shihezi, in the deserts of Xinjiang. In 1976, after the end of the Cultural Revolution with the death of Mao Zedong the family returned to Beijing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1978, Ai enrolled in the Beijing Film Academy to study animation. Here he founded the early avant-garde art group called the “Stars”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Living in America<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Following China’s reform in 1980, Ai was among the first 161 students allowed to leave China to pursue higher education. From 1981-1983, he studied English at the\u00a0University of Pennsylvania\u00a0and the\u00a0University of California, Berkeley. From 1983 -1986 he moved to New York City and enrolled at the Parsons School of Design. He also attended the Art Students League of New York\u00a0but did not complete his terms. Instead, he began to draw street portraits and work odd jobs to sustain a living. While living in New York till 1983, Ai began to draw influences from the likes of beat poet Allen Ginsberg and artists Andy Warhol, Marcel Duchamp, Jasper Johns, and Joseph Beuys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just as Ai\u2019s, unusual work was beginning to create a flutter in New York, he had to return to China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ai Weiwei Returns to China<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

In 1993, Ai returned to China as his father fell ill. Back home a part of him continued being the free American with anti-authoritarian beliefs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1993, while opening an art gallery was considered illegal in China, Ai founded the China Art Archives and Warehouse (CAAW) with some assistance and support by the late Hans van Dijk, a Dutch private art dealer living in Beijing. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ai held exhibitions at CAAW and invited artists, curators, and writers to Beijing introducing China to the world of art and vice versa.With co-author Feng Boyi he published a series of 3 books of modern artists of China known as Black Cover Book (1994), White Cover Book (1995), and Gray Cover Book (1997). In 2000, he co-curated the art exhibition Fuck Off<\/em> with curator Feng Boyi in Shanghai, China that began to attract eyeballs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1996 he began to build his own home and completed it in less than 65 days at a cost of USD 10,000. This prompted Ai the architect to move to Caochangdi, near Beijing, and built a studio there in 1999. In 2003, he set up an architectural firm called FAKE Design. Not fake though his designs were absolutely matchless!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2007, acknowledging Ai Weiwei\u2019s work the Chinese government selected Ai to collaborate with the Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron to design the iconic \u2018Bird\u2019s Nest\u2019 Olympic Stadium for the Beijing Games, 2008.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the same year during the Wenchuan earthquake when many schools were destroyed burying young students inside Ai unearthed and made public the corruption in Chinese government that lead to the collapse of these poorly constructed school buildings called “tofu-dreg schools”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From setting up an illegal art gallery to portraying the real China to the outside world, Ai had become China\u2019s most vocal political activist using his art form to highlight various issues. On January 1, 2011, Ai’s studio was knocked down. Then on April 3, 2011, the government stopped Ai Weiwei at Beijing Capital International Airport. The Chinese government put him under house arrest for 81 days for \u2019economic crimes\u2019 without filing a charge, confiscated his passport and refused him any further travel papers. Even after global governments, human rights groups, and art institutions intervened for his release, China refused to bow down under international pressure and continued to hold him without even notifying his family on his whereabouts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2015, when Ai got back his passport he moved to Berlin and later shifted to Cambridge, UK in 2019, from where he continues to internationally travel to exhibit his work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image credits: Unit London<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Controversial artist<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Some of Ai\u2019s best-known works which openly criticized the Chinese government led them to allow him to leave the county.<\/p>\n\n\n\n