KNOW THYSELF: A conversation with conceptual artist Ai Weiwei at BCB

The Bard College Berlin lecture hall filled up on the morning of Saturday November 25, 2023 with students, faculty, and friends of the college eager to listen to Ai Weiwei, world-renowned Chinese conceptual artist, talk about his latest exhibit, KNOW THYSELF. The panel was moderated by Dr. Geoff Lehman and Prof. Dr. Ewa Atanassow, accompanied by fourth year student Lilith Gao, as they discussed the inspiration behind Ai Weiwei's latest works and his trajectory as an internationally acclaimed figure.

KNOW THYSELF is composed of various replicas of famous works—Monet’s water lilies, Pollock’s familiar streaks of colorful paint—constructed out of thousands of Lego blocks. Tiny colorful squares, mass-produced and familiar to children and adults around the world, are brought together to create large replicas of familiar art in a new and unexpected way. The blocks transcend their own mass-produced materiality and instead stand tall on the gallery walls as fine art pieces after Ai Weiwei’s ingenious reappropriation.

From afar, one can barely tell the artwork is composed of thousands of tiny pieces, but upon closer examination, Lego blocks begin to appear, something Ai Weiwei compared to Ancient Greek mosaic art: “We have mosaics everywhere around us in the digital age, the pixels in all of our screens are the new mosaic form.” The legos make his art almost infinitely reproducible, which in itself is a commentary on today’s mass reproduction of well-known works. He urged the attendees to go through life with this critical eye of constant self-examination, something he hopes to inspire in the viewers through his work.

Ai Weiwei has a unique relationship with Berlin, a city where he has one of his studios, which he describes as a “halfway point between Beijing and New York.” Although originally from China, he has been away from his country for years due to political persecution and censorship of his art. “As long as I’m not in China, I’m a traveler," he explains. "I wander until maybe one day I go back.” Berlin is one of his bases, and he enjoys the city’s vibrant art scene and international atmosphere. 

“Art for me is an escape—but ironically it becomes popular and leaves me with nowhere to actually escape to,” he says of his international reputation. He continues on this journey of self-exploration through his creativity, and encourages those in attendance, especially the artists, to “act before you fully evaluate the situation. Art implies putting yourself in some kind of danger, so make mistakes and surprise people.” 

The full discussion can be viewed on BCB's YouTube channel, and Ai Weiwei’s exhibition KNOW THYSELF will run until March 3, 2024 at the galerie neugerriemschneider.  

Post Date: 12-11-2023