Ai Weiwei

Biography

The Chinese conceptual artist Ai Weiwei was born in 1957 as the son of the poet and painter Ai Qing. After the latter was sent into forced exile as a regime critic, the young Ai grew up in Manchuria and Xinjiang. From 1978 he studied at the Beijing Film Academy, followed his girlfriend to New York in 1981 and continued his studies at Parsons School of Design. During this time, he became interested in the conceptual art of a Marcel Duchamp or Andy Warhol and became involved with Dadaism, Pop Art and performance art. Above all, he was fascinated by the idea of the artist's existence as a life-determining attitude. In 1993, he returned to China because of his father's illness. The first illegal exhibitions with like-minded fellow artists quickly made him known in art circles. In the year of his return he also began the series "Study of Perspectives". With his experimental art, he repeatedly provoked and criticized the Chinese regime. In doing so, he makes use of spiritual traditional objects and antiques from his homeland, which, placed in new contexts, open up other perspectives. Through his socio-political commitment, he repeatedly exposed himself to state reprisals. In 2011, Ai Weiwei was imprisoned for alleged tax evasion and banned from leaving the country until 2015. In the same year, he left China and settled in Berlin, where he accepted a visiting professorship at the Berlin University of the Arts; today he lives in Cambridge. His work has been shown at exhibitions around the world in Australia, Belgium, China, France, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. He participated in the 48th Venice Biennale, the 2002 Guangzhou Triennale in China, the 2006 Sydney Biennale and documenta 12 2007 in Kassel. In 2011 he was awarded honorary membership of the Royal Academy of Arts, and in 2017 the Hrant Dink Foundation Award. Ai Weiwei is one of the most recognized and renowned artists of our time.