Ai has fused a lot of perennially popular art-world tropes into a single conceptual life-as-art juggernaut. He’s a figurehead of the once-burgeoning Chinese art market, an artist who keeps the line between life and work fluid; an auteur who creates his work in collaboration with other people, like the traditional craftsmen who used post-and-beam construction to assemble “Fragments” without a nail or screw, just a thwack of hammer sending wooden peg through perfectly aligned cut holes. He’s also destroyed artifacts, like the Han Dynasty urn he broke in a triptych of 1995 photos. He’s worked as an architect; sent 1,001 people from China to roam the streets of Kassel, Germany, in one of the works he displayed in the German megashow documenta XII in 2007; made films documenting the physical transformation of Beijing; protested corruption and human-rights violations in China on his blog, which was a part of his art, as well. Yet he’s said he wants his works to be judged on their merits as objects rather than ideas.

So: the objects. “Fragments” — here in its first American showing — is defined by its material: Ai collected the wood and thought about how best to use it. It’s an embracing physical presence, dominated by the warm darkness of the old wood. But the wood, hacked and muted, embodies a complex narrative about culture and value: Once-holy temples become meaningless and are discarded to make room for progress, then are reclaimed as ruins and reassembled into an object that ends up being even more venerated.

See a video of the installation of Fragments:

Meanwhile, in New York, a portion of the tiny sunflower seeds commissioned by Ai for an exhibit at London’s Tate Gallery sold at auction at Sotheby’s for $782,500.

Read more about Ai Weiwei and contemporary art in China via CDT.

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“I hope that they can make an independent verdict, but due to the interference of the tax bureau and the public security (bureau), it is difficult to say,” said Ai, China’s most prominent social critic whose 81-day detention last year sparked an international outcry.

“This is an extraordinary circumstance, but I think even if they didn’t accept this case, they wouldn’t be able to hide,” Ai said. “There were many problems with the procedures and the way they were carried out.”

Ai, 54, is urging a Beijing court to overturn the city tax office’s rejection of his appeal against the tax evasion penalty imposed on the company he works for, Beijing Fake Cultural Development Ltd., which has helped produce his art and designs.

Ai told Bloomberg that the case offers “a chance to look into the Chinese judicial system,” even if he loses the case:

Ai said the important thing is that the tax bureau’s case against him will be made public, allowing people to judge for themselves whether he was right or wrong.

“Every detail will be posted on the Internet and it will be a part of history,” he said.

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But the court told Lu on Thursday to produce the seal – a stamp embossed with the company’s name which is used in China on all official documents – that was confiscated by police when Ai was detained last year.

“We can’t get the seal back,” Ai told Reuters by telephone. “It’s in the hands of the police. It’s very much a Catch 22.”

Ai said Lu was giving the court an explanation on why the seal was missing in the hope it will waive the requirement. The court told Lu she will hear whether the lawsuit is accepted within the next seven days.

Alison Klayman, director of ‘Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry‘, discussed the case on WBEZ’s Worldview. While the odds in Ai’s legal battle may appear stacked against him, she says, he has a history of going through the system in order to demonstrate its flaws.

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International attention tends to focus on the Great Firewall, which stops Chinese citizens from reading sensitive content overseas, and constraints put on familiar western brands – the blocking of social media services such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, or the Chinese government’s clash with Google, which saw the internet giant relocate search services to Hong Kong rather than continue to censor results.

But the world’s largest internet population is far more interested in what happens on domestic sites – and particularly the “weibo” or microblog services, which boast about 300 million registered users. Microblogs, particularly Sina’s Weibo, are where the clash of political controls, commercial interests and the urge of millions to share their thoughts on official scandals, or just last night’s TV, play out.

“Weibo plays a much more important role in China than Twitter in the west, because of the heavy censorship imposed by the regime on the other media,” said Beijing-based scholar Michel Bonnin. “Weibo is also censored and cannot be considered a free public sphere but it is still the place where exchange of information is the most developed in China, and even traditional and official media are forced to go through it to have a real impact on the public. It is also the only place where the receptors of information can react and influence the circulation of information.”

Official anxiety about the repercussions has become increasingly evident. Some think the authorities might have shut down microblogs entirely if they did not fear the backlash. Others suggest they see them as both threat and opportunity.

Also in the series, artist, activist and microblogger extraordinaire Ai Weiwei writes an opinion piece, “China’s censorship can never defeat the internet“:

Even though we had reform and opening, “opening” didn’t mean “openness”; it meant opening the door to the west. It was more practical than ideological. At the very beginning, nobody – even in the west – could predict the internet would have so much to do with freedom of speech and that social media would develop in the way it has. They just understood it was a more efficient, fast and powerful means of communication.

But since we got the net and could write blogs – and now microblogs – people have started to share ideas, and a new sense of freedom has arisen. Of course, it varies from silly posts about what you’ve had for breakfast to serious discussions of the news but, either way, people are learning how to exercise their own rights. It is a unique, treasured moment. People have started to feel the breeze. The internet is a wild land with its own games, languages and gestures through which we are starting to share common feelings.

But the government cannot give up control. It blocks major internet platforms – such as Twitter and Facebook – because it is afraid of free discussion. And it deletes information. The government computer has one button: delete.

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“In the handling of the whole process for Fake [Ai's design company], some of their actions were illegal and violated regulations,” Ai told Reuters by telephone, adding that he is waiting to hear whether the court would agree to hear the suit.

The company’s lawyer, Pu Zhiqiang, told Reuters previously that authorities had not shown him any original documents with evidence of the alleged tax evasion and held a closed hearing last July.

Pu said it was illegal for them to do so. Ai was barred from attending the hearing, but his wife, Lu Qing, was present.

Ai said officials had also prevented the company’s accountant and manager from communicating with Ai or his lawyer since the case began.

The court’s decision on whether to hear the case is expected within a week. In any case, Ai told The Wall Street Journal’s Carlos Tejada, he thought it “hard to say” whether he might succeed. “It’s really a case decided by high officials. Other people [below them] just try to fill in the blanks.”

The Economist’s Analects blog discussed Ai’s predicament following the order last week to shut down four webcams broadcasting from his studio-home:

It would seem a thoroughly Orwellian absurdity that police could put him under near-total surveillance while forbidding him from surveilling himself. Asked about this, Mr Ai thought for a moment before saying, “Yes, Orwell. Or maybe Kafka.”

Indeed, that description—part Orwellian and part Kafkaesque—applies to much of Mr Ai’s experience over the past year. While it is always the police who deal with him (and always very politely, he is quick to add), he has no idea who in the government is handling his case. “Nobody even knows. That’s so beautiful!” the artist said.

This, he said, is how the Chinese regime works. “It’s there, but it’s not there. It’s not there, but it’s there. So freedom, anyone who pushes extra, just a little bit further, is always dangerous for the people who want to have absolute control,” he said.

See also an interview with Ai Weiwei conducted by netizens on Al Jazeera’s The Stream, and much more about the artist, via CDT.

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After the interview with Ai, The Stream and its viewers further discuss Ai Weiwei, his legacy, censorship, and social media with professor of Communication, Culture, and Technology JP Singh; and maker of the forthcoming  documentary Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry Alison Klayman. The blogpost accompanying the episode provides an excellent digest of Ai’s art and political activism, as well as the campaigns launched by his supporters around the world.

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weiweicam.com 四分钟前关闭。再见，喜欢隐私的朋友们。4 minutes ago the cameras have been shut down. byebye to all the voyeurs.

— 艾未未Ai Weiwei (@aiww) April 4, 2012

Ai subsequently said that authorities had ordered the shutdown without explanation. “I don’t even have a reason for why they put me away for 81 days. There’s never clear, rational discussion,” he told the BBC. To the AFP, he recounted his attempt to reason with the official who phoned him:

“I explained to them: you have 15 cameras on me, and the camera I set up in my bedroom is exactly the same camera that I had above my head during my 81 detention days,” he said on Thursday.

“So I am doing you a favour to (let you) really know what I am doing and have a close watch.”

He elaborated on similarities between the conditions of his detention and his newly self-imposed surveillance in a telephone interview with the BBC , and also spoke to CNN shortly before receiving the order to turn off the cameras:

In contrast with the authorities’ reticence, Ai had been quite open about his reasoning for starting the feeds in the first place. From The Guardian, on Tuesday:

“It is the exact day, one year ago, that I went missing for 81 days. All my family and friends and everyone who cared were wondering where this guy was. So on the anniversary I think people may have worries. It’s a gift to them: I’m here and you can see me,” he said ….

“This is also a gift to public security because they follow me, tap my phone and do what is necessary to get ‘secrets’ from me. I don’t have secrets,” Ai said, poiting out there were now 15 surveillance cameras within a 100m stretch of road outside his home, making it the most-watched area of Beijing ….

Ai said he had not decided how long they would remain in place. “I even forget they are there,” he said. “If someone has a photo of me picking my nose, I’m not self-conscious. I’m just going to do my work and see what comes out.”

He later said on Twitter that he had intended for the project to mirror the 81 days of his detention. It was unknown during this time when the artist would reappear, hence, perhaps, his initial refusal to specify a planned duration for the camera feeds.

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Ai said the tax authorities told him on Thursday afternoon that they will uphold the original decision. He said he plans to file lawsuits against the Beijing tax authorities and the Beijing public security bureau within the next 15 days.

“Thirty thousand people want us to get to the bottom of this and everyone is very supportive,” Ai told Reuters by phone.

“I can honestly say, I never had much expectations. This government, from the very beginning, has never changed any of its decisions. Which society is capable of that?” he said.

Ai paid a bond of 8.45 million yuan last November – all contributions from tens of thousands of supporters – that allowed him access to an administrative review of the tax evasion charges. He said at the time that he was pessimistic about successfully contesting the charges.

Read more about Ai Weiwei and his detention last spring via CDT.

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A rare interview with the Chinese dissident artist. He is currently under a form of house arrest in Beijing after he was detained for 81 days just under a year ago. In his first major North American broadcast interview since he was released, Ai Weiwei speaks candidly with Jian about corruption in China’s judicial system, China’s record on human rights and why he continues to speak out despite the real personal risk he’s taking to do so.

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“What was … interesting was that messages you’d expect to have been deleted all the time – like mentions of the Falun Gong [spiritual movement] or the dissident and artist Ai Weiwei – were not done so every time. It would seem to suggest that there is no automatic, blanket deletion going on,” says Bamman. Rather it points to a high level of human involvement and a nuanced approach.

The censorship mechanism is also agile – able to turn its attention to troublespots on demand. “This is the most surprising thing that we saw,” says Bamman. “In Tibet there was an overall deletion rate of 53 per cent – against 12 per cent in Beijing and 11 per cent in Shanghai ….”

Two other areas with relatively high minority populations, Qinghai and Ningxia, also suffered from particularly high rates of deletion according to Carnegie Mellon News, where the researchers’ methodology is explained in greater detail:

To study this “soft” censorship, the CMU team analyzed almost 57 million messages posted on Sina Weibo, a domestic Chinese microblog site similar to Twitter that has more than 200 million users. They collected samples of weibos from June 27 to Sept. 30, 2011, using an application programming interface (API) that Sina Weibo provides to developers so they can build related services.

Using the same API, they later checked a random subset of weibos to see if they still existed and another subset that included terms known to be politically sensitive. If a weibo was deleted, Sina would return what the researchers came to regard as an ominous message: “target weibo does not exist.”

In late June and early July, for instance, rumors began circulating of the death of Jiang Zemin …. On July 6, at the height of the rumor, 64 of 83 messages containing his name were deleted; on July 7, 29 of 31 such messages were deleted.

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Post tags: Ai Weiwei, Falun Gong, Internet censorship, Jiang Zemin, microblogging, Ningxia, qinghai, sina weibo, Tibet
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