Ai Weiwei Quotes

We see plenty of artistic work that reflects superficial social conditions, but very little work that questions fundamental values.

Ai Weiwei

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Quotes to Explore

• When I started out back in Louisville, there was Harry Collins. He was my first teacher. He saw that I was so obsessed with magic that he taught me the love of magic.

  

  Lance Burton
  • Love
  • Teacher
  • Magic

• I identified in a very deep way with the individuals I was writing about because the theme that runs through this story is of extraordinary hardship and the will to overcome it.

  

  Laura Hillenbrand
  • Writing
  • Deep
  • Story

• I went to this little performing arts school in downtown Phoenix. You had to dance or act, and everyone sang in choir. I started out playing the saxophone, but I always wanted to be in an orchestra. That was a dream as a kid, and there aren't a lot of saxophones in an orchestra.

  

  Kacy Hill
  • School
  • Dream
  • Dance

• I know you can be up one minute and drop the next, so I'm trying to maintain a steady course so I can have some longevity.

  

  Orlando Bloom
  • Up
  • Trying
  • Know

• Each book tends to have its own identity rather than the author's. It speaks from itself rather than you. Each book is unlike the others because you are not bringing the same voice to every book. I think that keeps you alive as a writer.

  

  E. L. Doctorow
  • Book
  • Voice
  • Identity

• The best philosophers were not academics, but had another job, so their philosophy was not corrupted by careerism.

  

  Nassim Nicholas Taleb
  • Job
  • Best
  • Philosophy

• If you live in rock and roll, as I do, you see the reality of sex, of male lust and women being aroused by male lust. It attracts women. It doesn't repel them.

  

  Camille Paglia
  • Women
  • Live
  • Reality

• No 27-year-old has the experience to run a company that does a quarter of a billion dollars a year in sales.

  

  Calvin Klein
  • Experience
  • Year
  • Sales

• I am a contradiction myself. I'm always looking for something that scares me because when I'm not scared, I'm not stimulated.

  

  Yasmine Al Masri
  • Contradiction
  • Scares
  • Stimulated

• I pick up the details that drive the organization insane. But sweating the details is more important than anything else.

  

  Indra Nooyi
  • Up
  • Important
  • Organization

• The Sino-Indian War in 1962 has fundamentally shaped and distorted Indian attitudes towards China. It also obscured a great deal of what has happened in China since 1962.

  

  Pankaj Mishra
  • Great
  • War
  • China

• I have a very rich and wonderful personal life, and at its core are my sons.

  

  Kate Mulgrew
  • Life
  • Rich
  • Personal

• Half the time, people will be abusing me on Twitter, and half the time, somebody will be praising me. So either it will go to my head, or I will take it to my heart. So better I stay away from it.

  

  Ranbir Kapoor
  • People
  • Time
  • Heart

• If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death, human life cannot be complete.

  

  Viktor E. Frankl
  • Life
  • Death
  • Suffering

• I work all day, do research, sketch my ideas, prepare for performances.

  

  Lady Gaga
  • Work
  • Day
  • Research

• Publishing for me is a business, not an ideology.

  

  Barry Eisler
  • Business
  • Me
  • Ideology

• Society can overlook murder, adultery or swindling; it never forgives preaching of a new gospel.

  

  Edmund Burke
  • Society
  • Never
  • New

• It is our duty, as parents and as teachers, to give all children the space to build their emotional strength and provide a strong foundation for their future.

  

  Kate Middleton
  • Children
  • Future
  • Parents

• Yes, there are parallels. The difference is that I just look at [my son] David and think that he's absolutely perfect, whereas you look at the finished book and you think, 'Oh, damn it, I should have changed that.' You're never happy. Whereas with a baby, you're happy. If you've got a perfect baby, you're just grateful.

  

  Joanne Rowling
  • Book
  • Happy
  • Perfect

• Every movie, especially when you get involved... takes something out of you. You learn something, but you give something to the movie. And after the movie, if the experience has been intense and a true experience, you're a little different afterward.

  

  Vincent Cassel
  • Different
  • Experience
  • True

• To be able to take my pictures, I have to look, all the time, at the people and places I care about.

  

  Sally Mann
  • People
  • Time
  • Care

• The most difficult part of making movies is to keep making them. Maybe, you could make the biggest hit in the world, but then the big problem is what to do next and how to maintain devoted to a certain instinct that I have about films.

  

  Emir Kusturica
  • World

• There are things that we still need to do. There's certain things at stake and our guys understand that. Also, we need to keep improving as a football team. That's the mentality that this group has taken on. They understand that they haven't reached their peak.

  

  Andy Reid
  • Team
  • Taken
  • Football

• We see plenty of artistic work that reflects superficial social conditions, but very little work that questions fundamental values.

  

  Ai Weiwei
  • Work