An Ai Weiwei Retrospective
The show goes on, despite the artist's disappearance
By JAVIER ESPINOZA
The first retrospective in the U.K. of Ai Weiwei's work, opening May 13 at London's Lisson Gallery, comes at a poignant time, with the whereabouts of the Chinese dissident artist still unknown after he was detained last month by authorities at Beijing Airport.His arrest has sparked condemnation world-wide. The Tate Modern, where the artist's "Sunflower Seeds" installation was recently displayed, has put up the words "Release Ai Weiwei" on the lightbox atop the museum. And eminent personalities, including writer Salman Rushdie and fellow artist Anish Kapoor, have spoken out against his disappearance.
Ai Weiwei
Ai Weiwei's 'Monumental Junkyard' (2007).
Although the Lisson Gallery selected Mr. Ai's works for the exhibition merely on his merits as a visual artist, Greg Hilty, the gallery's director and curator of the exhibition, told The Wall Street Journal Europe that the artist's work cannot be detached from his political activism, particularly in light of the arrest. Mr. Ai's work is the "art of engagement and, to that extent, you can't separate the artist from the social commentator and activist," though "we are primarily concerned with him as a visual artist.
"Ai Weiwei has this radically expanded view of what the work of art can consist of and can mean," Mr. Hilty adds. "In his case, it extends to his practice as an architect and designer, and also as an activist and social commentator."
Philip Tinari, a Beijing-based curator who has known the artist for over eight years, agrees. "For [Mr. Ai] all action, from online activism to architecture to art making, is part of a single project of arguing for a new awareness of Chinese society and the state of the world in general," he says. "While the majority of his works are not 'political art,' both his art and his activism reflect a profoundly moral concern for the future of his country and the state of the world."
Twenty marble doors dominate the works presented at the Lisson Gallery, and make reference to the enormous development of Beijing and China more broadly, Mr. Hilty explains. "[China] is virtually a building site. You see piles of doors left around houses in the process of being demolished," he says. "[Ai Weiwei] has taken the residue of urban development and has turned them into marble, a familiar medium of commemoration. He has taken something transient and passing, and has perpetuated it."
Other objects deal with one of the artist's familiar themes: monumentality. "Moon Chest" (2009), a series made of hulai, or hard wood, is a testimony to that. In the series, the artist has cut circles in the middle of chests to resemble the faces of the moon when looked at as a sequence. "[The chests] deal with monumentality, but at the same time, there is delicate poetry in these massive, monolithic objects," says Mr. Hilty, who together with Mr. Ai selected the works for the show when it was being planned earlier this year. "They show massive efforts of carpentry and construction of a very poetic line to do with the moon."
The exhibition, which runs through July 16, also includes pieces that reveal an aspect of Mr. Ai's struggle with authorities in China. "Surveillance Camera" (2010), a CCTV camera sculpted in marble, is one of the more salient pieces. Ahead of Mr. Ai's arrest, Chinese authorities had installed two surveillance cameras at the gate entrance of his studio, presumably as a reminder that he was being observed closely. "He's been under surveillance for a number of years, but he's quite relaxed about that," Mr. Hilty says. "On the other hand, it is not about him, but about a fact of life that's so prevalent [that] we rather take for granted. [Surveillance] is such a prevalent part of our life that it deserves elevating to some high status."
The 53-year-old Mr. Ai's open critique of Chinese society has raised many eyebrows among his country's establishment. Though he collaborated in the construction of the Beijing National Stadium for the 2008 Summer Olympics, he later snubbed the games by saying it was all part of a "pretend smile" of bad taste. That same year, the son of hailed revolutionary poet Ai Qing took part in an investigation into the exact number of children killed in the Sichuan earthquake. "He has the personality of a sage-as-hooligan, the calm bearing of someone who understands the world on a different level from most and the muted ferocity of an advocate," Mr. Tinari says.
The U.K. retrospective will also include two video installations: the "Second Ring" (2005) and "Chang'an Boulevard" (2004), a boulevard that runs through Beijing which the artist photographed at regular intervals. "He is bearing witness, documenting and in a quite mesmerizing way, he acknowledges the past, while focusing on the future," says Mr. Hilty.
Visitors will be able to see first-hand a series of Han Dynasty vessels, which were part of the artist's "Dropping the Urn," which some regard as essential to understand Mr. Ai's work. To Mr. Tinari, the vessels represent the artist's "most basic statement of his philosophy of critique by destruction." Part of the original work included a three-part black-and-white picture of Mr. Ai dropping an ancient ceramic vase, which subsequently smashed at his feet, to highlight the obliteration of history in his country.
Mr. Ai's art should be at the forefront of people's attention, regardless of the artist's arrest, Mr. Tinari says, adding: "It is important not to lose sight that his art is of global significance, well apart from his arrest or political troubles."
New York-based filmmaker Alison Klayman, a friend of Mr. Ai, says his art is about "setting the conditions and seeing where they lead. His art is about communicating what he thinks and engaging with the world and society."
Write to Javier Espinoza at javier.espinoza@wsj.com
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