Each year, more people want to become artists.
AI WEIWEI[Cultural departments] don’t care about culture. Maybe they’re the furthest from the people who understand culture.
More Ai Weiwei Quotes
-
-
Your own acts tell the world who you are and what kind of society you think it should be.
AI WEIWEI -
Democracy, material wealth, and universal education are the soil upon which modernism exists.
AI WEIWEI -
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.
AI WEIWEI -
I don’t care if this is a great cultural event or a national symbol. It has nothing to do with me. It deals with the city.
AI WEIWEI -
Every day I’m learning something new from the practice. It’s very rewarding.
AI WEIWEI -
I also doubt a man can give really clear reasons for anything.
AI WEIWEI -
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 -
…photographs are facts, but not necessarily true… The present always surpasses the past, and the future will not care about today.
AI WEIWEI -
Creativity is part of human nature. It can only be untaught.
AI WEIWEI -
That’s why I always question this sense. The feeling of home really requires a lot of trust. It requires you to identify with it, which I always find myself very contradictory to.
AI WEIWEI -
Civilization has evolved toward more acceptance, understanding and tolerance of global thinking. If we accept differences, our creativity booms. It makes life much more colorful.
AI WEIWEI -
Behind every political deal in this country, the first casualties are always the ordinary people, who are barely treated as human.
AI WEIWEI -
Chinese government is very clearly losing power in every aspect, but trying to fix up all the problems or potential problems.
AI WEIWEI -
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.
AI WEIWEI -
I lived there [ in New York City] as an artist, but never as a Chinese artist.
AI WEIWEI -
My typical day is I wake up and appreciate that I can still wake up.
AI WEIWEI -
I will bring 1,001 Chinese to participate as my artwork there – any Chinese who is a Chinese passport holder and over eighteen years old could apply through my blog.
AI WEIWEI -
A lot of the time [in the U.S.], I was thinking about how spending time is always questionable or is always the biggest obstacle in my life.
AI WEIWEI -
My definition of art has always been the same. It is about freedom of expression, a new way of communication. It is never about exhibiting in museums or about hanging it on the wall.
AI WEIWEI -
We never really see the global situation as a total situation. Today’s political leaders are still lacking of the vision.
AI WEIWEI -
Of course, there [in China] has to be chaos. It has to be crazy, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong about it except this government, which is really incapable of doing anything meaningful.
AI WEIWEI -
Liberty is about our rights to question everything.
AI WEIWEI -
The purpose of art is the fight for freedom.
AI WEIWEI -
They lack any ability to sense what is beautiful or what is proper. They can be learned and skillful, but they lack the ability to make their own free judgment. It is really sad to see young adults of 20, 25 years who were never taught to make their own decisions.
AI WEIWEI -
In my case, I was stuck there for quite a while. New York is large enough to be a very abstract city, so nobody cares.
AI WEIWEI -
You have so many museums in the West, and so many shows, you need somebody to show the work, otherwise it’s empty.
AI WEIWEI