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Everything is selected by the central government without good judgment or an understanding of culture to make it really safe. They will become nobody to maintain their power and be raised to the next higher level.

Ai Weiwei

By participating in the society we live in, we understand our conditions and the way we relate to the world.
AI WEIWEI

Condition Participating Relate Society Understand Way World
We should use this public sphere and redefine – beyond China’s borders – what a government is allowed to do, where its powers end and where the realm of a citizen’s privacy begins.
AI WEIWEI

Allowed Border Country Government Public Redefine Sphere
Creativity is the power to act.
AI WEIWEI

Act Creativity Power
The [China] government has improved in the last years. Of course, the structure is still the same; there’s still a one-party system and strong censorship.
AI WEIWEI

Censorship Government Last Party Stem Strong Year
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

Art Beyond Character Consciousness Country Personality Related Think Understanding Work
Self-censorship is insulting to the self. Timidity is a hopeless way forward.
AI WEIWEI

Censorship Forward Hopeless Insulting Self Timidity Way
I think it’s a responsibility for any artist to protect freedom of expression and to use any way to extend this power.
AI WEIWEI

Artist Expression Extend Freedom Power Responsibility Thinking
We have to give our opinion, we have to say something, or we are a part of it. As an artist I am forced to say something.
AI WEIWEI

Artist Forced Giving Opinion Say Something
I am everywhere and I am nowhere. That’s the beauty of the Internet Age.
AI WEIWEI

Age Beauty Everywhere Internet Nowhere
I think optimism is whether you are still exhilarated by life, whether you are curious, whether you still believe there is possibility.
AI WEIWEI

Believe Curious Optimism Still Thinking
If artists cannot speak up for human dignity or rights, then who else will do it?
AI WEIWEI

Artist Dignity Else Right Speak Then
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
To experience poetry is to see over and above reality. It is to discover that which is beyond the physical, to experience another life and another level of feeling.
AI WEIWEI

Above Beyond Experience Feeling Over People Physical Poetry Reality
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

Believe Country Personal Structured Success Thinking
Dictatorship is a story about death of others who turn out to be you coincidently.
AI WEIWEI

Coincidently Death Dictatorship Stories Story Turn
…photographs are facts, but not necessarily true… The present always surpasses the past, and the future will not care about today.
AI WEIWEI

Always Care Past Photograph Present Surpasses Today True

Everything is selected by the central government without good judgment or an understanding of culture to make it really safe. They will become nobody to maintain their power and be raised to the next higher level.

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Everything is selected by the central government without good judgment or an understanding of culture to make it really safe. They will become nobody to maintain their power and be raised to the next higher level.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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