- All Quotes
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They tell us it will be about 'emotions' and 'friendship,' that it will be a night of joy. Who are they kidding?
Ai Weiwei -
But the internet is like a tree that is growing. The people will always have the last word – even if someone has a very weak, quiet voice.
Ai Weiwei
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Art is always about overcoming obstacles between the inner condition and the skill for expression.
Ai Weiwei -
The disaster-makers always get away, while the innocent are always punished.
Ai Weiwei -
This simple form of repression, of using the method of not letting anyone speak, will never succeed.
Ai Weiwei -
The language of communication will always need to be renewed.
Ai Weiwei -
The Olympics are an event manipulated into misleading people into believing that we have entered a new, successful and harmonious period in our history. This is not true.
Ai Weiwei -
The Olympics are an opportunity to redefine the country, but the message is always wrong.
Ai Weiwei
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Cover-ups and deception are the nature of this society. Without lies it won’t exist.
Ai Weiwei -
I don’t feel powerful at all. I am still under this kind of detention, and you know, this is kind of a bail. Even yesterday I realized while trying to take care of the baby, at the park, I had been secretly followed and it’s quite fragile. Maybe being powerful means to be fragile.
Ai Weiwei -
The people who control culture in China have no culture.
Ai Weiwei -
It is absurd that so much money has been wasted on manipulating public opinion, on simulating emotion. This nation is notorious for its ability to make or fake anything cheaply. 'Made-in-China' goods now fill homes around the world. But our giant country has a small problem. We can’t manufacture the happiness of our people.
Ai Weiwei -
With 140 words in Chinese, you really can write a novel. Most of Confucius’s sentences are only four words, so 140 words might take his whole life to write. And you can discuss the most profound ideas related to democracy, freedom, poetry.
Ai Weiwei -
They don’t believe in liberty. They don’t believe in China before the Communists. There is only one simple, clear task: to protect their control, to maintain their governing. Which is such a pity.
Ai Weiwei
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Antiques exist as evidence of the cultural tracks we made in the past.
Ai Weiwei -
Being an artist is more of a mindset, a way of seeing things; it is no longer so much about producing something.
Ai Weiwei -
The world is not changing if you don’t shoulder the burden of responsibility.
Ai Weiwei -
Only with the Internet can a peasant I have never met hear my voice and I can learn what’s on his mind. A fairy tale has come true.
Ai Weiwei -
I think restrictions are an essential condition in the fight for freedom of expression. It’s also a source for any kind of creativity.
Ai Weiwei -
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
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On the Internet, people do not know each other, they don’t have common leaders, sometimes not even a common political goal. But they come together on certain issues. I think that is a miracle. It never happened in the past. Without the Internet, I would not even be Ai Weiwei today. I would just be an artist somewhere doing my shows.
Ai Weiwei -
I think China is in a chaos now and it could be more chaos. It’s an orderly chaos. It’s a party that ruthlessly violates every human’s basic rights to serve its own purpose.'
Ai Weiwei -
The world is a sphere, there is no East or West.
Ai Weiwei -
I wouldn’t say I’ve become more radical: I was born radical.
Ai Weiwei