Slideshow: Weiwei-isms

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei reflects on freedom of expression in Weiwei-isms

Ai Weiwei is a Chinese contemporary artist. He works in a variety of mediums including sculpture, photography, architecture and the written word. Weiwei is a heavy critic of the repressive Chinese government, and as a result, he was arrested in 2011 at a Beijing airport and held for two months under unknown charges.

Ai Weiwei’s Weiwei-isms, edited by Larry Warsh and published by Princeton University Press in 2012, is a collection of quotes, tweets, and aphorisms by the artist. The book is divided into six major sections, including “On Art and Activism,” “On Government, Power and Making Moral Choices,” and “On the Digital World.” The Huffington Post, Big Think and The Village Voice awarded the collection as one of the best books of 2012.

Sampsonia Way chose ten quotes from the section “On Freedom of Expression” of Weiwei-isms to showcase Weiwei’s astounding ability to share incredibly powerful ideas about censorship and every human’s right to freedom of speech in very few words.

Copyright 2013 by Ai Weiwei and published by Princeton University Press. Used with permission of Princeton University Press. All rights reserved.