Ai Weiwei told me recently that he thinks the government’s decision to detain him for 81 days last year and keep him under strict bail conditions ever since is completely related to his effective use of the Internet to communicate his views and exchange ideas with others.

He told me: “If not for my use of the Internet, I would just be an artist trying to put up a canvas in a gallery or a museum, which has almost no influence for the majority of society. It’s only because I acted on the Internet that the pressure comes. It made a lot of people feel scared, because they can never really stop my influence on the netizens.”

That’s why I made my first feature documentary, “Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry” — to record what happens when someone makes the choice to speak openly and provocatively and face down the consequences, as Ai Weiwei and so many other human rights lawyers, writers, activists and young netizens do every day in China. I hope to inspire new discussions about the role of art, social media, underground documentary and creative forms of resistance in our interconnected world.

Alison Klayman directed and produced the feature documentary, “Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry,” which premieres at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival.

Back in October we had a chance to interview Klayman during PopTech 2011:

His ability to communicate does transcend. That’s also a part of going to the social media sphere. It’s recognizing the limitations of the art world. He wants to be recognized in good museums, and to have his art be valued too. But he recognizes that the art world can be a rarefied environment, or something that’s more for an international audience more than for mainland Chinese.

(via poptech)

(Source: The New York Times, via poptech)

1 year agoJanuary 23, 2012