{"id":2902,"date":"2014-04-11T16:52:28","date_gmt":"2014-04-11T21:52:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bytebot.net\/blog\/?p=2902"},"modified":"2014-04-11T16:52:29","modified_gmt":"2014-04-11T21:52:29","slug":"ai-weiwei-evidence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bytebot.net\/blog\/archives\/2014\/04\/11\/ai-weiwei-evidence","title":{"rendered":"Ai Weiwei – Evidence"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was fortunate enough to have some free time earlier today evening, and headed over to the Martin-Gropius-Bau<\/a> to catch the Ai Weiwei<\/a>\u00a0(@aiww<\/a>)exhibition titled Evidence. This is the first time I\u2019ve seen Ai Weiwei\u2019s work as I missed it at the Tate Modern in London a while back.<\/p>\n

He is a modern artists. Playing around with a lot of different materials to come up with his artwork. And he makes use of the Web. I guess his claim to fame is that he\u2019s all for freedom of speech & expression (something that\u2019s hard to do in China – a dissident he is, if you must), and the fact that he\u2019s a documenter of modern happenings (everyone is interested at the amazing pace of growth in China – he shows that by video recordings of highways, or driving around and recording his journey as an example).<\/p>\n

For me, I was really moved by Zodiac Heads<\/a> (Circle of Animals). I would so grab the rat, tiger and dog as examples!\u00a0<\/p>\n

China in ten years (I first went to Beijing in 2004 – it has changed a lot in a decade) has become a lot more materialistic. The car of choice used to be the Audi; it still is, but you find a lot of other luxury vehicles on the roads nowadays in Beijing. So the Han Dynasty vases painted with metallic paint<\/strong> from BMW & Mercedes was great for cultural insight. Culturally, the want of antiques is also high and the Table & Chest with stripped chairs<\/strong> was also interesting – remove 1mm sheen from Ming Dynasty furniture and they look like new. What is the purpose of antiques again?<\/p>\n

I enjoyed his Study of Perspectives (a selection at moma<\/a>) as well. He goes to famous landmarks and takes a photo with his left middle finger.<\/p>\n

He portrays the disputed islands (between China & Japan). I loved the stools because they each tell a story (6,000 of them). I enjoyed his re-enactment of how he was held captive by the Chinese authorities for some time. It\u2019s shocking to see how you would sleep with a light on, always be watched by security guards and have everything covered up – where you have to do your own laundry and the only thing you get are 6 hangers. Its sad to see that his studio in Shanghai was demolished at a moment\u2019s notice – but he made artwork out of it. He showed the evidence that was confiscated (lots of laptops\/video recorders\/PCs).<\/p>\n

A protest pre-demolition involved river crabs<\/a> (he xie). Guess that\u2019s the beauty of the Chinese language :)<\/p>\n

If you get the chance to check Ai Weiwei\u2019s work out, its well worth it and will take you a good 2 hours (read a review<\/a> in The Economist). You can\u2019t take photos inside, but you will leave with a lot of memories. If you can\u2019t see this one in Berlin, check out a video: Ai Weiwei – Dumbass<\/a>. At five minutes long, it makes my video of the week.<\/p>\n