It became like a symbolic thing, to be “an artist.” After Duchamp, I realized that being an artist is more about a lifestyle and attitude than producing some product.
AI WEIWEIThis so-called fame or being better off doesn’t really attract me at all.
More Ai Weiwei Quotes
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Maybe being powerful means to be fragile.
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A historical property has morals and ethics of the society that created it and it can be revived. What I mean is that we can discover new possibilities from the process of dismantling, transforming, and recreating.
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If we all say the same thing, then I think the government has to listen. But because no one is saying it, I become singled out, even though what I’m saying is common sense.
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We’re different, and you’re dangerous.” That kind of thinking stops human, civilized evolution. It’s dangerous to create that kind of tension.
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Otherwise, I think the building can be bigger, larger, and the city can be much more crazy. The problem is the government structure is so deadly stupid, not really solving problems but creating a lot of problems itself every day.
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In a society like this there is no negotiation, no discussion, except to tell you that power can crush you any time they want — not only you, your whole family and all people like you.
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We are living in a popular culture where everything is overexposed.
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I don’t think China should care if this crazy old guy should have a show here or not.
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It’s the place they take you before they give you over to the judicial system. You stay there for a year or two and they make you really suffer to confess everything.
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We are not on – even just a step away from the most brutal and primitive crudity. To be very crude on those issues, which is always challenges and we always have to look at the situation like a mirror, to draw some understanding.
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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.
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We literally lived underground. We dug a hole and lived there for years. My father cleaned public toilets, even though he was a highly respected poet.
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For years, I refused to go to any openings, not even my own.
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In this kind of dictatorship, in this kind of totalitarian society, it is easy to make deals that you cannot make in a democratic society.
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I think China is laughing about the results of the presidential elections. China, Russia, they all laugh about it.
AI WEIWEI