It’s like the mountains, the ocean and the rivers. It has its own geological forms. Societies cannot be flat. But during change, human rights, human dignity and free speech have to be protected. Otherwise, we’ll be going backward.
AI WEIWEIThe 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.
More Ai Weiwei Quotes
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I think China is laughing about the results of the presidential elections. China, Russia, they all laugh about it.
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By participating in the society we live in, we understand our conditions and the way we relate to the world.
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The practice of photography is no longer a means for recording reality. Instead, it has become reality itself
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Today, we jump into this globalization of the economy and the internet age.
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Destroy or build. Crazy or noncrazy. I’m not nostalgic about the old city. I don’t enjoy it that much.
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A few thousand are to be built in the next few years, all using taxpayer money. But there is no system, no research, no content, no good programs, no good managers.
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I think art certainly is the vehicle for us to develop any new ideas, to be creative, to extend our imagination, to change the current conditions.
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…photographs are facts, but not necessarily true… The present always surpasses the past, and the future will not care about today.
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For artists and intellectuals today, what is most needed is to be clear about social responsibility, because that is what most people automatically give up. Just to protect yourself as an individual is very political.
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Dictatorship is a story about death of others who turn out to be you coincidently.
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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.
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Even today the borders they’re seeing the physical borders are very different from the political borders. Because all those powers are so connected, and you cannot even see whose interest in what move.
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Being an artist is more of a mindset, a way of seeing things; it is no longer so much about producing something.
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I think my stance and my way of life is my most important art.
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I always want people to be confused, to be shocked or realize something later.
AI WEIWEI