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Warhol influenced me because of his writing. If I had never read his writings and interviews, I would never have understood his work.

Ai Weiwei

People have a tendency to become elite rather than to care about the general conditions of the society, which makes me sick. It’s an unbearable condition.
AI WEIWEI

Care Condition General Make People Sick Society Tendency
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.
AI WEIWEI

Artist Encouragement New York
Even if there have been setbacks during these past years, China is changing. China’s society is opening.
AI WEIWEI

Changing Country Opening Past Society Year
Everyone of us is a potential convict.
AI WEIWEI

Convict Everyone Potential
Ordinary people should have the same ability to understand art as anybody else. I don’t think art is elite or mysterious. I don’t think anybody can separate art from politics.
AI WEIWEI

Ability Anybody Elite Else Mysterious Ordinary People Politics Separate Understand
I think by not letting young people be fully informed, how can they have energy and passion and the right picture of the world? I think that’s the true crime.
AI WEIWEI

Informed Letting Passion People Picture Right Thinking
The society was so different [in China] – it was a feudalistic society. It didn’t come to a point of industrial revolution until twenty years ago.
AI WEIWEI

Come Country Different Feudalistic Industrial Point Revolution Society Twenties Year
I also have to speak out for people around me who are afraid, who think it is not worth it or who have totally given up hope. So I want to set an example: you can do it and this is OK, to speak out.
AI WEIWEI

Afraid Given Out People Speak Thinking Totally
Censorship is saying: “I’m the one who says the last sentence. Whatever you say, the conclusion is mine.” But the internet is like a tree that is growing.
AI WEIWEI

Conclusion Mine People Quiet Saying Sentence Tree Voice
[Therefore] holding a trial outside the court. I think that is fairness, that is justice, that is a civil society. Otherwise call it an evil society because everything is hidden.
AI WEIWEI

Development Everything Fairness Holding Internet Letting Outside People Trail
I have to find a place for my own. I have to search for my own happiness.
AI WEIWEI

Find Happiness Own Place
I think by shattering it we can create a new form, a new way to look at what is valuable – how we decide what is valuable.
AI WEIWEI

Decide Looks New Shattering Thinking Valuable Way
If there’s the right condition, I always want to express the concept or ideas in a very independent way.
AI WEIWEI

Always Condition Ideas Independent Right Want Way
A nation that has no music and no fairytales is a tragedy.
AI WEIWEI

Fairytale Music Nation Tragedy
Nationality and borders are barriers to our intelligence, to our imagination and to all kinds of possibilities.
AI WEIWEI

Barrier Border Imagination Intelligence Nationality Possibilities
A society is healthy only when it allows its members to discuss their thoughts openly. This is also the only way that a society can gather consensus, let everyone express his or her wish, and foster creativity.
AI WEIWEI

Creativity Discuss Healthy Openly Thought Wish

Warhol influenced me because of his writing. If I had never read his writings and interviews, I would never have understood his work.

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Popular Authors

Warhol influenced me because of his writing. If I had never read his writings and interviews, I would never have understood his work.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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