HUFFINGTON
09.30.12
THE DISRUPTOR
a collection of porcelain river
crabs, nodding to a public feast
he hosted at his Shanghai studio
in honor of its imminent destruction. In Chinese, river crab also
means harmony, which is a word
the government uses as a euphemism for censorship.
“It’s very hard to even say if
this was a complete way to express myself because I was detained and all my work was under some kind of censorship,” Ai
says. “So if I have to talk about
it, the only thing I can say is I
made my best effort.”
Thinking wishfully, Ai had
planned to spend four-to-six
weeks in the U.S. around the
Hirshhorn opening, and accepted
a position as a visiting professor at the Berlin University of the
Arts, he told the New York Times.
If he could get his passport back,
Ai said he’d go anywhere. Even
North Korea (“I’m crazy to see
[it],” he says). But when it comes
to the long haul, Ai would always
choose China. “I like to live in
China because I have so many
emotions [tied to it],” he says.
“It’s something beyond my
understanding because I happen to be Chinese.” Dream city?
“I hate every city in China,” Ai
responds with a weak laugh.
“The problem is you see so much
injustice. And the people, they
don’t care [to change it].”
For all his grim tidings, Ai
gives off a childish air, a quality
that’s easy to imagine when you
see the animated zombie stickers
his three-year-old son, from an
extramarital relationship, planted on the back of his iPhone.
(“You know the game, ‘Plants
and Zombies,’” he explains. “My
son he doesn’t like zombies, so
he just keeps the plants and gives
the zombies to me.”) Like a child,
he’s obstinate, quizzical, and
sometimes, finds reality is best
ignored. Like an artist, he ignores
it by musing on strange metaphors: China’s government as a
tree long gone, and himself the
dinosaur that bit it dead.
“I hope my son’s vocabulary
doesn’t include words like political or activist — ѡ