Ai Weiwei Quotes

Ai Weiwei, who is both a widely admired conceptual artist and a fearless human-rights activist, has been on the bad side of the Chinese government for years.

There were no dissidents then in the USSR because they were all killed.

I was thinking of writers living in East Europe before the Berlin Wall came down. They wrote fantastic stuff but were dealing with a situation that was almost impossible to deal with, but they found a way.

Iranian filmmakers are not passive. They fight whenever they can, as creative expression means a lot to them. The restrictions and censorship in Iran are a bit like the British weather: one day it's sunny, the next day it's raining. You just have to hope you walk out into the sunshine.

Literature has its own life, even in a dictatorship like the Soviet Union.

The freedom to express yourself without fear - that perhaps is something we in the U.S. take for granted. It's almost inconceivable to think we would be afraid to express our opinions or thoughts, but that's not true for all parts of the world now, and certainly not before World War II.

Political or religious dissenters are the plague of every totalitarian regime.

Today, my freedom as a poet is taken by a censor; tomorrow, my freedom as a citizen will be taken by a policeman. Today I am banished from the theater; tomorrow, I shall be banished from the land. Today, I am gagged; tomorrow, I shall be deported. Today a state of siege exists in literature; tomorrow, it will exist in the city.

I will not have the Federal Theater used politically.

When the arts become a political football, they lose.

Filmmakers and artists always thrive during more liberal times.

Under Stalin, artists weren't dissidents; all they hoped was to survive and write.

Imagine a world without art: it's George Orwell's nightmare!

To have art suppressed is very dangerous to society.

The Soviet Union had only one party. You couldn't express yourself freely; you couldn't admit belief in God. And yet this terrible regime understood that human beings have to express themselves, through music, even at a bad level. All kids studied music automatically, just as they did maths or languages or sport.

I think arts should be liberal, people should be allowed to express themselves. It happens in most democratic countries in the world, and I don't see why it should be different in India.

Art is where we make a stand. If we don't make it there, freedom of expression is lost for everyone - for artists, for journalists, and for everyday people.

Art penetrates, no matter how many bans you put out.

It's true that the human body is more vulnerable than the products of the human mind. We need to protect artists and journalists people to allow them to work.

We know what totalitarian looks like, we know what oppression looks like, we know what the dumb culture of totalitarianism smells like. This is it! It's happening now, and the future of the world is being decided. So, get out there, make your own sites, take action!

In a free country it is the duty of writers to pay no attention to duty. Only under a dictatorship is literature expected to exhibit an harmonious design or an inspirational tone.

Freedom of expression is a very essential condition for me to make any art. Also, it is an essential value for my life. I have to protect this right and also to fight for the possibility.

Only tyrannies understand the power of art.

Everyone should have the right to go off and do their music or do their books. The people who are in the position to censor they're really not down to reality where that certain artists are coming from.

[O]ne can scarcely be frightened off writing what one wants to write for fear an obscure reviewer should patronise one on that account.