Sunflower Seeds in Tate Modern
Earlier this year, when Ai Weiwei declared he would be doing an installation exhibition at London, no one cared about it. Yet, this time, Ai Weiwei, a son of the most famous Chinese patriotic peot's son, apperantly has figured out his own way of getting more attention from both inside and outside of China.
Ai Weiwei was not a political artist before, I mean, when he was just being famous for his architecture design and creative installation settings, living in suburb of Beijing, he is just normal - instead of standing on the opposite of the government, pointing its nose now. What happened then? What are the facts that lead Ai Weiwei to such a cynical "political clown"?
After Wenchuan earthquake in southwest China happened two years ago, social organisations like the Red Cross had called for a national donation for the reconstruction work of damaged areas. And well, people donated, a lot. Ai Weiwei was there helping raise money as a public figure and of course, some kind of representative of the Chinese art industry. A few weeks later after the governement announced to start the post-disaster construction work, Ai published a blog article, saying that a large proportion of raised funds flew into government officers' private pockets instead of being used to build houses and schools. This article, had brought himself into the fierce political center. Then the government started to pay attention to him and of course, becoming suspicious on all of his activities.
Speaking for myself - a citizen of the country, Ai Weiwei has succeeded drawing our attentions onto the money matter after the earthquake which is the only effect his article had left now - for I believe most of Chinese people are just kind and nice yet not wise enough. Although corruption exits in this country, they still believed in their own government that it would spend their money properly - especially when the money was donated for helping those in needs. Meanwhile, Ai Weiwei himself could not prove what he had said about the corruption problem as well. But this has drew western attentions too.
As BBC has interviewed the artist when the British Prime Minister David Cameron visits China today, people who has learnt basic communication theories could understand the reason of choosing him as the interviewee easily - one of the most famous and influencial media group in the world is just setting another news agenda although their Prime Minister is there struggling to settle business deals with "the booming eastern giant". Of course Ai Weiwei did not let them down, especially when he is planning more corperations with more foreign art galleries.
One of my colleges here in the uni once had written an article defending Ai Weiwei's deeds towards the government months ago, and he said to me this morning that he felt ashamed of defending such an unworthy person after all. He has listened to BBC4 this morning when Ai Weiwei spoke totally like an unreasonable person - placing all other Chinese people at his standpoint and cursing the Chinese government as it had never, ever done anything good to its citizens. How could he become such a "political-driven" artist??? I even went to Tate to have a look at his display there last weekdend! And to be honest, I felt really bad about that now.
To be honest, I do believe that artists are idealistic, and they gonna be totally depressed if they find out the reality standing so far away from their expectations. And these expectations apparently concern more on human rights rather than economic development. Just like his patriotic-poet father Ai Qing did decades before, Ai Weiwei loves his motherland and the people so so much. The more he loves this country, the more he hates what the government did, because he feels betrayed. Nomatter how fast does the economy grow, one simple lie may destroy everything.
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