"Ai's own work was bolshie and anathema to custodians of good taste. His Study of Perspective series showed him raising a middle finger at global sites among them Tiananmen Square, the Eiffel Tower, the White House that are expected to produce awe, delight, reverence. In the self-explanatory photographic sequence Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn (1995), itself the follow-up to Han Jar Overpainted with Coca-Cola Logo (1994),"
"A 2000 exhibition in Shanghai that he helped to stage bore the name Fuck Off. (Its Chinese subtitle was Ways to Not Cooperate'.) If anything, Ai's talent to bemuse and enrage has only intensified in recent decades. A blog he wrote between 2005 and 2009 (posts had titles such as How Could We Have Degenerated To This? and If You Aren't Anti-China, Are You Still Human?) scandalised the authorities and was yanked off the internet."
Ai Weiwei rejects harmony as a guiding principle and embraces provocation in art and activism. He joined the Stars artist group at the Beijing Film Academy in the late 1970s, demanding political democracy and artistic freedom. After a decade in New York, he returned to Beijing in the 1990s and published samizdat-style books of politically charged art. His Study of Perspective photographs show him raising a middle finger at global landmarks including Tiananmen Square, the Eiffel Tower and the White House. Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn (1995) and Han Jar Overpainted with Coca‑Cola Logo (1994) challenge cultural value and iconoclasm. A 2000 Shanghai exhibition titled Fuck Off advocated non-cooperation.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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