Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei is a Chinese artist, author and social commentator.

Name: Ai Weiwei (艾未未)

Gender: Male

Date and Place of Birth: 1957, Beijing, China

Movement, Style, School or Type of Art: Sculpture

Important Works: Designed the Bird’s Nest (Beijing National Stadium)

Ai Weiwei is a Chinese artist whose works have been exhibited across Europe, Asia and the United States, including the 48th Venice Biennale (1999) and Documenta 12, where his sculpture Template collapsed after a storm.

Ai Weiwei is known for his outspokenness, especially after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, and his innovative artwork. He was the artistic consultant for design for the Bird’s Nest, the iconic stadium built for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. At the time, he voiced his anti-Olympic views and distanced himself from the project.

Ai’s outspokenness and investigation into the number of students killed in the devastating Sichuan earthquake have led to scrutiny from the Chinese government. His blog was shut down and several of his computer accounts were hacked. Ai was beaten by police in Chengdu in 2009. He suffered internal bleeding that required emergency brain surgery.

Born in Beijing, Ai Weiwei’s father was Chinese poet Ai Qing, who was denounced during the Cultural Revolution and sent to a labor camp in Xinjiang. Ai lived in Xinjiang for five years.

Ai attended Beijing Film Academy. He was one of the founders of Stars, an avant garde art group (1978-1983). Ai moved to New York in 1981. While in New York, he attended Parsons School of Design. He returned to Beijing in 1993 when his father became ill.

In the 1990s, Ai published three books about a new generation of artists: Black Cover Book (1994), White Cover Book (1995) and Gray Cover Book (1997). Ai built a compound of houses and opened his studio REAL/FAKE in Caochangdi, a village of art galleries and spaces northeast of Beijing, in 2000.

Ai is married to artist Lu Qing. They have a home in Beijing and a home in Columbia County, New York.