Ai Weiwei at Royal Academy of Arts

This was a very interesting exhibition - one of the best I have seen recently.

Ai Weiwei is known for his artworks which comment on his political concerns within China.  He overtly condemns state corruption; suppression of human rights and free speech. He portrays his chinese identity by his use of materials ( jade and porcelain) and historical materials from Beijing.  He also uses maps of China to give shapes and outlines within his work.

Ai Weiwei did a series of work about Government corruption soon after the Sichuan earthquake (2009?).  Hundreds of thousands of people died.  Poorly erected modern buildings collapsed during the earthquake, including schools and hospitals - leading to multiple deaths and casualties.  At the exhibition, there was a video running, which explained in detail, why the buildings collapsed during the earthquake - weak concrete mixtures; insufficient steel reinforcement; reinforcements incorrectly positioned within columns, so they were biased and unevenly strong; reinforcements not hooked over at the top, so they slid when stressed.  He made an artwork "Straight".  Ai Weiwei clandestinely bought two hundred tons of damaged steel reinforcement bars 'rebars' and his team manually straightened them, using traditional craft skills.  "Straight" changes damaged and corrupted materials into their original wholesome form - a material comment upon human actions.  This took 4 years.  He was persistently questioning the Government regarding the facts surrounding the poor building quality.  This led to him being arrested and detained during the artwork.  He had been enquiring into the names of the children who had been killed, which the Government refused to supply.  On his blog, he published the names of children he had identified from speaking to their parents and communities.  In May 2009 the Government closed down his blog and imprisoned him. On his return to the community he found his workers had continued the artwork and he had thousands of straightened rebars.  He set up a huge rectangle of orderly piles of rebars, set out in the pattern of China. He uses traditional craft skills (metalwork) to create an artwork that is about the poor quality of building in China.

Oe of the questions posed to us at our last class, was "what questions are you answering?" and "how is this apparent?".  Ai Weiwei reuses and recycles materials from his experience and environment.  He is keen to use materials from an authentic source - e.g. marble from specific quarries. He is questioning the value placed on objects, craft and human life.  He questions the values of historical society and contemporary life, and whether the difference matters.  He considers whether authenticity matters - the same skills are used in modern forgeries as originals.  He says "Liberty is about our right to question everything".  He may have taken this to extreme in questioning (and challenging) the Chinese Government, as they ended up imprisoning him for 81 days under extreme psychological intimidation.  He made this experience into a chilling artwork so he shows he will use any material the Chinese Government provides him, to make art that does not show them in a favourable light.

Very thought provoking.  Money well spent to go to this exhibition.