Ai Weiwei, artist, activist

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-ca-cm-ai-wei-wei-la-shows-20180927-story.html

Sep 27, 2018
Ai Weiwei is weary from travel.

The Chinese artist and human rights activist shuffles into the Marciano Art Foundation's cavernous Theater Gallery — he arrived in L.A. from Berlin just last night and has spent about half the year, he says, traversing the globe making films or exhibiting art. The Marciano space, a former Masonic temple theater, is dimly lighted and nearly empty, a box of cool, gray concrete. But at the far end of the room, light emanates from a new piece Ai has created – he's seeing it installed here for the first time.

Ai slowly makes his way across the room, soft spoken and a bit spacey, his loose cotton clothing fluttering ever so slightly from the AC — as if crossing a dark ocean toward the light. Finally, he peers over a railing into the glowing, sunken Black Box gallery housing his work. His cheeks lift and his eyes brighten.
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Ai, an outspoken political dissident, has long been targeted by the Chinese Communist government for channeling his social justice activism into online projects and art that has resonated around the world. In 2011 he was arrested and detained, in a secret location, for 81 days after having been accused of vague economic crimes. Since getting his passport back in 2015, he's resided in Berlin but has kept an active studio in Beijing, his Zuoyou studio, where "Life Cycle" was assembled under his guidance.

Just days after the artwork was shipped to L.A., Ai's Beijing studio was demolished by the Chinese government. No one was hurt, but some artworks were damaged, others totally destroyed. He'd been alerted, months earlier, that he'd eventually have to vacate the space because it was being redeveloped – but the demolition began, as a surprise to him, before the mutually agreed upon evacuation date and without his consent.

"It was quite surreal, I was shocked," he says. "But in a state like China, you have no space to make any kind of argument or communication. You have to just stand there and watch."