August 3, 2022 • 39 mins
Martha, a friend and fan of the monumental Chinese artist and political activist Ai Weiwei, notes some similarities between them: a love of food, a love of cats, a life of artistry, and incarceration. Eight years after they last met in his studio in Beijing, they re-connect to talk about his experience “disappearing” from the world into a Chinese state prison where “they count your eye blinks.”
Martha asks him about the inspiration behind her favorite of his provocative and engaging works: Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads, Forever Bicycles, and more. How many people does it take to create 100 million porcelain Sunflower Seeds? Which of these two is more outspoken? You’ll learn this and more.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I remember fondly visiting you in two thousand and seven
at your studio in Beijing, and then again in two
thousand and fourteen. A lot has happened since then. Yes,
since then, I always have been waiting for you to
come back, but they'll never come back to you now.
(00:23):
Hi everyone, This is Martha Stewart and welcome to our
podcast today. I am so excited because we are talking
by zoom to one of the most extraordinary human beings alive,
by Way Way. Ei Way Way is world famous. He
is an amazing person involved in civil liberties and human
(00:47):
rights and very very very outspoken about in human treatment.
I don't want to give a big long introduction because
Ai Wei Way himself has so much to say, and
I just want to say Hi, Hiwayway, Hello, So nice
to see you again. I have been back to China
once since two thousand and fourteen. My two grandchildren, Jude
(01:10):
and Truman, are studying and are quite fluent in Mandarin
right now, so I took them to China in two
thousand and twenty right and we were there in January,
right before COVID. The last thing we did in China
was to ice skate on the Imperial Palace Lake and
(01:32):
they had such a good time. They opened it. That
day was like January five. They opened the ice was perfect.
We were the first people to ice skate on that
lake and we and I thought of you. I thought
of you and wished that you were there. You were
not there because you had already I think, left China.
Right when did you leave China? Well, I left twos
(01:55):
on the fifteen, two thousand twenty, was already in Germany,
in Berlin. And I want to get into the nitty
gritty of why you had to leave your homeland. I mean,
you've had you've had a rough time in that homeland,
and yet you have become one of the most famous
Chinese people ever. Had so much happened, and I hope
(02:18):
that maybe you could tell us a little bit more
about about your time early years in China, when you
were your whole family was exiled, and then in two
thousand and eleven, I guess when you were put in prison.
One of the most famous Chinese people put in prison
by the government. And I just want to know why
(02:40):
why were you first exiled in the first place with
your family? Well, my father was the point. It's the
most one on modern poet for China. His name was
I Ching, right, I Chin. His book just published by
random House. U you know, I King select boy three
(03:00):
and he is one of the revolutionary poet and it
was it's the first generation of the Leader's chairman or
drawing line. They were in year and struggling and the
later they established the new Nation nine in forty nine.
So he's uh, he's thinking are quite different or made
(03:24):
the leaders happy. He's not an even anti communist, his
communist himself, but he just there's different opinions or the
different attitude that is not allowed in in the Communist party.
So he was criticized as the rightist and the exiled
(03:46):
in the nineteen fifty seven, which is a year I
was born. So since I was born, I was with
him in the so called re education camp in in
very removed the area in Xinjia. And nobody knows that
kind of treatment can last of forever, and nobody knows
(04:12):
twenty years we spent time in exile and the condition
living conditions is un unspeakable. You know, it's not nothing
we have today we can we have that time, you know,
we are we're living a dig digaut underground and there's
(04:35):
no water almost like uh like animal almost, But we
did survive to n one. I had a chance to
come to the United States, so I spent about twelve
years in the United States. By nineteen three, I went
back to see my father after twelve years havn't seen him.
(05:00):
And yeah, then ten really passed very fast. I spent
another thirty two years in China until two thousand fifteen.
I kind of being forced off after two southly eleven.
I was arrested because my online activities basically some kind
(05:26):
of criticism with action. So I organize people to investigate
the government. It's around doings, which nobody would like something
like that in in any authoritarian society. So I I
kind of went too far and they don't like it.
(05:51):
They have to find a way to censor my voice
under to to smear my action, and to put me
in jail behind bars too, you know, just trying to
scare people. And yeah, that's basically the story. You spent
eighty one days in prison? Can you describe the prison
(06:14):
for us? Yes, I spent eighty one days in Sacred detention.
It's not even a prison, it's a location nobody knows
where they are, and I was blindforded to take me
into that location. And the whole time I was guarded
by military police and nobody knows where I just disappeared
(06:41):
from the public. My mom doesn't know. I couldn't have
a lawyer, and the daily I would go through these
kind of interrogations, which mostly a nonsense. You know, it's
what they're trying to interrogate from an artists. Only because
I openly criticize them. Did they ask for an apology?
(07:02):
They asked me to admit the kind of crime, and
I'm really made uh, But I always tell them we
need a trial to you know, open trials, so I
need a lawyer to to I even need some kind
of procedure to recognize the kind of crime they are
(07:24):
accusing me. But of course later I realized they just
trying to use these kind of tactics to trying to
scare me. And also they made the television recording, but
later they didn't use it. It's supposed to popular, uh
you know, to to publicize to international television maybe my
(07:49):
way of a talk about sens which doesn't really make
not qualified. So yeah, they made them some kind of
public television recording. What what were the conditions like, did
you have a bed to sleep on or were you
in a room by yourself? The room is very small
and I just have one bed under one chair. I
(08:12):
have to sit down the chair and put my hands
on my my my lap and standing sitting there very
still a cannomal any action. I would take the first
report to them to say I have to go to toilet.
Then they have to give me admission for me to
(08:37):
do and the two soldiers will walk me into the bathroom,
and that they were standing on side of me to
watch me to do whatever I have to do in
the bathroom, and the twenty four hours will be two soldiers.
They're shifting every hour to watch me. And even when sleep,
(09:00):
they're standing right on the side of my bed. The
light is always on and they are watching me if
I really fall into sleep. Were you ever allowed outside
during that eighty one days? No, they are creating a
world to make you believe there's nothing outside. The whole
(09:21):
universe is that room. And the after a few days,
you would also believe that you're totally cut off. You
don't believe the people outside still remembers you, or the
question where you are you know there they have very
(09:42):
good psychological some kind of special treatment, make you believe
you're in their hands and there's no way you can
there's no outside. You know, they don't have any kind
of physical violence, but mainly it's a psychological vilements because
(10:05):
you have to do everything according to their schedule. And
you see, they will say you can't walk now you're
walk in the room on six tails and you walk
forward and turn, walking back and turn. So you have
to do hours of this kind of walking, very much
like a military type of walking. And so they would
(10:30):
ask you the folding your bed into some kind of
perfect cube or take maybe monsters to learn how to
to make that just like knife cut shop corners. And
you know it's kind of military ridiculous training. Wow, that
(10:52):
is harsh. And what kind of food did they feed you?
The food was okay, you know they try the basic
The tactics they have is too if their words is
to protect you, so protect you to to suicide or
protect you to hurt yourself before they make some major decisions.
(11:18):
So you are basically highly protect. There's a civilian cameras
uh in in several corners of the room under these
people in the next room, watching exactly you're every of
your movement, even your eye blinks, they can know. They
(11:42):
can blow it up to see what you're trying to do.
It's kind of very I would say, unique treatment. The
doctor would come in every day to measure your blood
pleasure and and you appeals. You have to eat in
(12:02):
front of them. You have to open your mouth. They
wouldn't look at you swallowen the appeals. You know, they
will make sure you did all the procedure. And you
didn't know what the pills were, so you just had
to take them anyway you have to take. It is
about Otter, and I assume it's something good for you,
(12:25):
because they are really scared you're you're going to have
some problem. Now. We heard that you were incarcerated because
of tax evasion. All kinds of rumors came out of
China at that time. We were all so worried for you.
You know, so many of us thought about you. People
who admit you or just admired your your amazing work,
(12:46):
were worried about you, and and we wondered how you
were faring, and we couldn't write to you. Actually, I
also worried it's not a worry that I have any
kind of crime. I'm worried. It's my kind voice. Many
people being sentenced over fifteen thirteen years, that's very normal.
(13:09):
I know many people has been put away, So with
my activity, I can easily be put away like that,
and I would have no chance to really see my son,
how he would grow up. He was only two years old.
(13:30):
And the one I was arrested and the interrogator tells me,
you know, even when you're released, yourseln never recognized you.
Under They're very they're very quite honest. They said, after
two years you're finished. You're still will be still alive,
but you're not the same person anymore. So we see
(13:53):
too many people like that. So I never worried about
accusation of my crime. I never did any crime, and
as they also know that. But of course I don't
know if anybody would make some kind of voice for me.
And later found out a lot of people are supporting me.
(14:16):
Of course, so many, so many people supported you, and
uh yeah, it's a it's a hard harsh treatment for
being an outspoken person in a authoritarian country. That's I mean,
it's very very difficult. So many countries in the world
are are going in that direction. Now, what do you
(14:37):
think of that? I would think history always uh teachers lessons,
I would say, and you know, not obviously right or
obviously justice, idea can can be easily achieved. Is always struggle,
(14:58):
is always struggle, and that maybe for too long we
take the liberty and too easy, and we think liberty
can be basal struggle or democracy baslf struggle, which is
not true. I take every generation, every individual, to defending
(15:18):
the human dignity and to defending what we believes, and
that should be a normal condition, and we for too
long we forget about it. You know, it just either
everybody to act on that. It was nine eleven in
the United States. I was such a happy person up
(15:40):
until nine eleven when we suffered the World Trade Center disaster,
and and I thought, you know, I've never been afraid
in my life, and here we go. I was afraid
for the first time. I had to walk down the
streets of New Yorker City that I really loved, and
I had to look up every day to make sure
(16:00):
nothing was going to happen. And then we had an
election of a man who really changed or at least
brought to the forefront, a very very fractured America, and
we're all thinking, now, gosh, our country is not the
same country it was or that we hoped it would be.
(16:21):
And so we're living through a lot of what other
countries in the world are living through. I never thought
we would see it so clearly, but we are having
a very hard time in the United States right now.
Do you agree with me that what's going on is
really sad and dangerous. I think what we see America,
(16:44):
we also have to put in the into the world map,
and you seeing the world changed dramatically with the Russian
invasion to Ukraine, with China's fast development, and also China
has a long strategy trying to make it much more
(17:07):
stronger dominant the world in every aspect. So you'll see
American still struggling with many, many, very fundamental issues of
a human rights and many many issues seems almost like unsolvable.
(17:27):
So the whole political institution of the world is really changing.
It's not a likely in the seventies, eighties or nineties
we are still living a much peaceful time. Yeah, it's
a it's a very different world. And to me, I
do a lot of business in China, we manufacture many
(17:49):
many of our products in China, and China has the
upper hand. I really admired the growth and the extraordinary
innovation of China. But I worry, as you worried, and
as you paid dearly for the authoritarian nature of the government.
(18:09):
And we're just in a very very strange state right now.
And I and this whole thing with the Ukraine, as
you mentioned, is just devastatingly sad. And do you see
that there in England too? Do you get the news? Yes,
of course we The problem is everything happening in front
of us, and we we can get all the informations
(18:34):
at the same time. And I want to make us
feel powerless, you know, we feel almost like impossible to
to do something to help the situation. But still we
have to understand all the power has to come back
to individuals and the world doesn't matter where it goes.
(18:55):
I have to benefit each individual and so so I
take the individual too to act, and the two to
tell people how do you think and and clearly and
also to honestly reflects those feelings it is your expression,
(19:20):
and to communicate, so to make sure they are really
very responsibility for whatever happens in the world your exhibits
(19:40):
that you have created, so many amazing, amazing exhibits. So,
for example, your sunflower seeds. I have my fourteen seeds
that you gave me either way way, can you hear them?
These are your seeds that you gave me from I.
Of course I still have them there, my precious seeds.
(20:02):
I think about you when I look at them, each
seed hand crafted out of porcelain and hand painted by
How many people did it take to make a hundred
million of these porcelain seeds? It picked up all the
one souls and six hundred people working for seven hundred days, wow,
(20:23):
to make all the and and how much did they
weigh when you finally finished making a hundred million seeds?
What did that pile of seeds weigh? What? It's about
a hundred fifty tents tons? Oh my gosh. So so
a ton of everybody is two thousand pounds. That's a
big pile of porcelain. And you exhibited them first at
(20:47):
the Tate Gallery in London. Yes, and the show be
in the Turban Hall in Pig Gallery. I read that
you were in the Originally I saw it, but I
didn't walk in it. I think it was closed off
to walking when I finally got to see it, but
people were allowed originally to walk on the seeds. What
(21:07):
was your message, Well, I want to make something very small.
It looks quite fragile, and but it takes a complicated
message to make it, to like make the highest porcelain
pieces and take about twenty different procedures to to really
make one. But everything handmade. It looked exactly the same,
(21:32):
but none of them can can be identical lead to another.
It's not the same because they all hand depended by once,
all six hundred women, day by day. And you know,
so that is uh fascinating, and I think, and it
(21:52):
looks like an ocean, but none none of those pieces
are the same. Incredible, So that's an exhibit. Then you
did the Forever Bicycles another exhibit in two thousand and seventeen.
Tell us about what the what the twelve D twelve
D bicycles or hundred bicycles. There are several times being
(22:16):
exhibited from maybe twelve hundred to five thousand. You know,
this is several version. I went to the exhibit. I
have a picture here of me at the Hershorn Museum
in Washington that was Yeah, that was two thousand and thirteen.
That was a beautiful exhibit though, thank you. And so
(22:40):
what was the message for the bicycles, Well, bicycle is
something awful everyday objects has already made one. We grew up.
We see bicycles as very luxuries. If you can't have
a bicycle the time I was working in the field,
you have to walk very far away in the desert,
(23:03):
and you know it's not possible to to you know,
scorby desert. You don't have drop over water and there's
no no trees, so it's no shadow you under the sound.
So we always dream to a fault bike. And then
your river crabs thirty two hundred little porcelain red crabs,
(23:28):
reddish and orangesh crabs. What was that about. Well, river
crabs in Chinese have the same name with the color
hormonoous society. Yeah, that means the government sink that society
has to be unified or peaceful. You know, it's kind
(23:51):
of propaganda. And so it's kind of pond because it
sounded the same chis it means the same. So I
used that as some kind of irony or two as
a humor, and everybody online in China understand what I'm
(24:14):
talking about. And then you did the chairs in two
thousand and eleven, a thousand and one beautiful, beautiful um
Chinese antique chairs. What was that about. That's about the
chairs and the chairs is uh as part of our tradition.
(24:39):
Chairs is not as functional as some kind of furniture,
but the rather reflections of Chinese understanding of our society
about family, about this kind of moral or ritual aspect.
So but in the modern days, all those a disappeared,
(25:01):
destroyed people only have a plastic chairs. They you can
buy a plastic chair in exchange for the antique chairs
because antipachers that they're always losing our shaking and it
doesn't look like flashy and but a plastic chair looks
(25:23):
much better. So so you know, the whole society had changed.
The values, the judgment and the tradition disappeared. So that's
why I collects antiques and to try and to learn
from those uh, those older objects or elements. I had
(25:49):
a I have a good friend literally may Pay, who
lives here in the United States. She comes from Western China,
UM and she told me a lot about the struction
of the antiquities during the revolution and how sad it was.
And so she when there's a garage sale or or
(26:09):
an estate sale, she goes to find old Chinese things
to buy because she values them so much she remembers
them from her childhood. And then everything sort of disappeared
and became the plastic chair, and she really admires the
old workmanship and the old and they and they value.
So is does that have something to do with all
(26:30):
of that? Oh? Yes, we are. We are being cut
about from our own memory, you know, tradition. It's about
part of our memory, about our identity to a center
where they come from. And that that is probably the
worst condition. While I'm being cut off format your memory,
(26:54):
so you'll get lost who you are and you don't
know where you come from. So too for me, that's
a struggle to to leave on the memory under to
be too to discover or memories. So do you think
a lot of people who have left China read Chinese
(27:16):
history and try to reassimilate their whole background into the
real history. Well, it's it's extremely difficult because the history
always been rewriting by the modern time, and the China
basins is kind of highly as Subtorian society. A censorshipe
(27:36):
under under changes that the lines and tombs in the history,
so it's very hard to get a real, so called
honest or or special view about what happened in the past.
Is there any history book way way that you could
(27:57):
recommend in English for our listeners to read that you
think does depict the history in a in an accurate fashion.
There's a Every history writer have their own perspective, but
it's always nice to to say that perspective are very
(28:20):
clear and also it's some kind of historical record or proof.
So recently I'm reading a book called The Silk Road,
which is by British and American writer Robert and the
Silk Road as a a very interesting writing in in
(28:48):
re talk about the world history from different perspective. Silk Road.
So everyone look up the book Silk Road and take
take away ways recommendation. What about the zodiac heads? When
(29:14):
I saw those zodiac heads in New York around the
fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel, I was just entranced.
What's the history of that of those particular fantastic zodiac
heads that have animals representing the twelve months. Well, those
(29:34):
animal has zodiacs. I was seeing Ching dynasty in the
in the palace of the King Emperor till French and
British soldiers looted them and a since then disappeared. But
(29:55):
in the recent years about seven of the twelve great
really appeared in the market. So Chinese government encourage people
to buying it back to us. Uh, some kind of
patriotic act, which is a questionable because those rudias are
made for Manchu people. Who is in inventor of China
(30:22):
is not the invader or of China, so I think
that is quite ironic. I made I fixed the one
who is never been found, which are five of them,
so combined with the other sevens as we have a
complete zodiac cat So first time I it's been showing
(30:46):
in the a little fountain in front of Plaza Plaza hotel.
Right that time I am still in the in the detention,
so I completely have no idea those it's going to
be showing, and uh, yeah, it's being showed under the
Mayor Broomberg also give open pulp about me and about
(31:13):
the work, which I think is quitey impressive. It was wonderful,
wonderful Mayor Bloomberg did an incredible job of of letting
us see your work firsthand. It was amazing. And those
are ten foot tall? Where are they now? Where? How
many sets did you make? They are? One set of
(31:35):
them is seeing Lacoma in the Los Angeles Museum. They
permanently collect that, so anybody wants see it, they should
go to LACMA in Los Angeles. And uh, I still
have more exhibits that. I'm so interested in the Olympic
Stadium in two thousand and eight, the Bird's Nest, which
(31:57):
I went to see when it was still under construction,
and you collaborated with Swiss architects Herzog and demoron. What
was that collaboration like And was the conception of a
bird's nest? What? What's the idea there? Well, it's uh,
they hurst them around. They teamed with me because they
(32:18):
know not much about Tiness culture and they know I'm
very interesting architecture and the art. So they come out
this uh concept for the competition. Under they win the competition,
then the whole architecture Burnest is trying to reflect this
(32:42):
kind of openness and the bondness about the modern society.
And of course, uh, you know later being used for
different other purpose. You know, it become a strong propaganda
element for the party. But our decline for the architecture,
(33:03):
I think it's very very strong and very beautiful. It is.
It is such a beautiful stadium. Did and it worked
very well too. Yes, and now you're doing documentaries. A
documentary was just was just shown at a festival in England.
Is that true yours truly? There's a documentary about my
(33:25):
art projects, your truth yours truly showing in this musical
festival in England. Yes, the film is about the show.
In a contrast, it's about how to write postcard to
those political prisoners all over the world. Hundred seventies six
(33:49):
of them, and of course some of them are already
released on most of them are still in jail. Wow,
so we we know how many of there are are?
Do you think there are more than that? There's a
hundred times that we don't know there only know some
noticeable one. Most of them not will be forgotten or
(34:14):
never would come to the public attention. Are you working
on a on a new work now that we should
be anticipating. Uh, well, I'm artists, you know, I am
a self employed I always work. I don't have vacation.
(34:35):
But yeah, but there's nothing I have to do. It's
just it's just some kind of self motivation or you know, well,
you you work in such big numbers for many of
your exhibits. Is there is there something that you're collecting
now or or creating now that have you been commissioned
(34:58):
by another museum somewhere that we should we should know about.
They are not announced, so I cannot announced it. But yes,
there's always had me. Well, we're always looking forward to
um anything that I way way does, and we're just
so proud of to know you and so so happy
(35:20):
that you are obviously thriving living in a community where
you can not only teach and influence but also survive.
Do you have any hopes of ever going back to China? Yes,
every day I want to go back, but still we
have to wait when the situation become more clear. You know,
(35:43):
I kind as my country and I care about it
and know so many and nice sense happening in China.
But of course, uh, I don't want to be putting
in some kind of disappeared Again, that's not a very
good solution for that. Is your studio still there? The
(36:08):
one I visited. I have a student in painting. Yes,
we had also read that a studio of yours in
in Shanghai or somewhere else was destroyed. Is that true not?
It's true in Shanghai and also invaging part of my
studio destroyed. But that's why our normal kind of destroys
(36:28):
many since and they also reviewed the many sense, so
you know it's for something in China is not a
big deal. I It's just so incredible what you have
done and what you have taught us. And I'm just
so pleased to have major acquaintance several times and to
be able to talk to you so intensely about what's
(36:51):
going on with you. You know, we have a lot
of similarities. Food is one. Of course, you cooked me
lunch twice and I I still owe you lunch at
my house to eat from my garden. And I hope
someday you come to the United States and have lunch
here at my farm because I would love to do that.
You also love cats as much as I do. Do
(37:14):
you have any cats there in Cambridge? Have a too
cast in Cambridge and I'll have a new location you
in discipline in their Apple eight pass. And then we
also have prison in common. I hate to bring up
my prison because it was like it was like a
going away to a children's camp compared to what you
(37:37):
had to go through. But incarceration is hideous, enforced incarce incarceration,
And I just want to say that that you have
survived your your tormentors very very well ey way Way,
and I'm very proud of you. It's a horrible thing
to be incarcerated. And America has to revisit their penis
(37:59):
is them as so many countries have to, because it's
just sometimes and many times a very unfair way to
treat humans. And you're an artist, and I think I'm
an artist, and you're outspoken, and I think I'm outspoken.
I'm not outspoken enough, but someday I'll be able to
be a little bit more outspoken, I hope. But you
(38:21):
have You are brave and courageous and uh and really admirable.
Thank you so much for speaking with me today and
um and I hope we get to meet again sometime
in the near future, and good luck with all your
new work. I hope that I'll come to see you
and there it will be the best reason to come
(38:42):
to New York, thank you,
I remember fondly visiting you in two thousand and seven
at your studio in Beijing, and then again in two
thousand and fourteen. A lot has happened since then. Yes,
since then, I always have been waiting for you to
come back, but they'll never come back to you now.
(00:23):
Hi everyone, This is Martha Stewart and welcome to our
podcast today. I am so excited because we are talking
by zoom to one of the most extraordinary human beings alive,
by Way Way. Ei Way Way is world famous. He
is an amazing person involved in civil liberties and human
(00:47):
rights and very very very outspoken about in human treatment.
I don't want to give a big long introduction because
Ai Wei Way himself has so much to say, and
I just want to say Hi, Hiwayway, Hello, So nice
to see you again. I have been back to China
once since two thousand and fourteen. My two grandchildren, Jude
(01:10):
and Truman, are studying and are quite fluent in Mandarin
right now, so I took them to China in two
thousand and twenty right and we were there in January,
right before COVID. The last thing we did in China
was to ice skate on the Imperial Palace Lake and
(01:32):
they had such a good time. They opened it. That
day was like January five. They opened the ice was perfect.
We were the first people to ice skate on that
lake and we and I thought of you. I thought
of you and wished that you were there. You were
not there because you had already I think, left China.
Right when did you leave China? Well, I left twos
(01:55):
on the fifteen, two thousand twenty, was already in Germany,
in Berlin. And I want to get into the nitty
gritty of why you had to leave your homeland. I mean,
you've had you've had a rough time in that homeland,
and yet you have become one of the most famous
Chinese people ever. Had so much happened, and I hope
(02:18):
that maybe you could tell us a little bit more
about about your time early years in China, when you
were your whole family was exiled, and then in two
thousand and eleven, I guess when you were put in prison.
One of the most famous Chinese people put in prison
by the government. And I just want to know why
(02:40):
why were you first exiled in the first place with
your family? Well, my father was the point. It's the
most one on modern poet for China. His name was
I Ching, right, I Chin. His book just published by
random House. U you know, I King select boy three
(03:00):
and he is one of the revolutionary poet and it
was it's the first generation of the Leader's chairman or
drawing line. They were in year and struggling and the
later they established the new Nation nine in forty nine.
So he's uh, he's thinking are quite different or made
(03:24):
the leaders happy. He's not an even anti communist, his
communist himself, but he just there's different opinions or the
different attitude that is not allowed in in the Communist party.
So he was criticized as the rightist and the exiled
(03:46):
in the nineteen fifty seven, which is a year I
was born. So since I was born, I was with
him in the so called re education camp in in
very removed the area in Xinjia. And nobody knows that
kind of treatment can last of forever, and nobody knows
(04:12):
twenty years we spent time in exile and the condition
living conditions is un unspeakable. You know, it's not nothing
we have today we can we have that time, you know,
we are we're living a dig digaut underground and there's
(04:35):
no water almost like uh like animal almost, But we
did survive to n one. I had a chance to
come to the United States, so I spent about twelve
years in the United States. By nineteen three, I went
back to see my father after twelve years havn't seen him.
(05:00):
And yeah, then ten really passed very fast. I spent
another thirty two years in China until two thousand fifteen.
I kind of being forced off after two southly eleven.
I was arrested because my online activities basically some kind
(05:26):
of criticism with action. So I organize people to investigate
the government. It's around doings, which nobody would like something
like that in in any authoritarian society. So I I
kind of went too far and they don't like it.
(05:51):
They have to find a way to censor my voice
under to to smear my action, and to put me
in jail behind bars too, you know, just trying to
scare people. And yeah, that's basically the story. You spent
eighty one days in prison? Can you describe the prison
(06:14):
for us? Yes, I spent eighty one days in Sacred detention.
It's not even a prison, it's a location nobody knows
where they are, and I was blindforded to take me
into that location. And the whole time I was guarded
by military police and nobody knows where I just disappeared
(06:41):
from the public. My mom doesn't know. I couldn't have
a lawyer, and the daily I would go through these
kind of interrogations, which mostly a nonsense. You know, it's
what they're trying to interrogate from an artists. Only because
I openly criticize them. Did they ask for an apology?
(07:02):
They asked me to admit the kind of crime, and
I'm really made uh, But I always tell them we
need a trial to you know, open trials, so I
need a lawyer to to I even need some kind
of procedure to recognize the kind of crime they are
(07:24):
accusing me. But of course later I realized they just
trying to use these kind of tactics to trying to
scare me. And also they made the television recording, but
later they didn't use it. It's supposed to popular, uh
you know, to to publicize to international television maybe my
(07:49):
way of a talk about sens which doesn't really make
not qualified. So yeah, they made them some kind of
public television recording. What what were the conditions like, did
you have a bed to sleep on or were you
in a room by yourself? The room is very small
and I just have one bed under one chair. I
(08:12):
have to sit down the chair and put my hands
on my my my lap and standing sitting there very
still a cannomal any action. I would take the first
report to them to say I have to go to toilet.
Then they have to give me admission for me to
(08:37):
do and the two soldiers will walk me into the bathroom,
and that they were standing on side of me to
watch me to do whatever I have to do in
the bathroom, and the twenty four hours will be two soldiers.
They're shifting every hour to watch me. And even when sleep,
(09:00):
they're standing right on the side of my bed. The
light is always on and they are watching me if
I really fall into sleep. Were you ever allowed outside
during that eighty one days? No, they are creating a
world to make you believe there's nothing outside. The whole
(09:21):
universe is that room. And the after a few days,
you would also believe that you're totally cut off. You
don't believe the people outside still remembers you, or the
question where you are you know there they have very
(09:42):
good psychological some kind of special treatment, make you believe
you're in their hands and there's no way you can
there's no outside. You know, they don't have any kind
of physical violence, but mainly it's a psychological vilements because
(10:05):
you have to do everything according to their schedule. And
you see, they will say you can't walk now you're
walk in the room on six tails and you walk
forward and turn, walking back and turn. So you have
to do hours of this kind of walking, very much
like a military type of walking. And so they would
(10:30):
ask you the folding your bed into some kind of
perfect cube or take maybe monsters to learn how to
to make that just like knife cut shop corners. And
you know it's kind of military ridiculous training. Wow, that
(10:52):
is harsh. And what kind of food did they feed you?
The food was okay, you know they try the basic
The tactics they have is too if their words is
to protect you, so protect you to to suicide or
protect you to hurt yourself before they make some major decisions.
(11:18):
So you are basically highly protect. There's a civilian cameras
uh in in several corners of the room under these
people in the next room, watching exactly you're every of
your movement, even your eye blinks, they can know. They
(11:42):
can blow it up to see what you're trying to do.
It's kind of very I would say, unique treatment. The
doctor would come in every day to measure your blood
pleasure and and you appeals. You have to eat in
(12:02):
front of them. You have to open your mouth. They
wouldn't look at you swallowen the appeals. You know, they
will make sure you did all the procedure. And you
didn't know what the pills were, so you just had
to take them anyway you have to take. It is
about Otter, and I assume it's something good for you,
(12:25):
because they are really scared you're you're going to have
some problem. Now. We heard that you were incarcerated because
of tax evasion. All kinds of rumors came out of
China at that time. We were all so worried for you.
You know, so many of us thought about you. People
who admit you or just admired your your amazing work,
(12:46):
were worried about you, and and we wondered how you
were faring, and we couldn't write to you. Actually, I
also worried it's not a worry that I have any
kind of crime. I'm worried. It's my kind voice. Many
people being sentenced over fifteen thirteen years, that's very normal.
(13:09):
I know many people has been put away, So with
my activity, I can easily be put away like that,
and I would have no chance to really see my son,
how he would grow up. He was only two years old.
(13:30):
And the one I was arrested and the interrogator tells me,
you know, even when you're released, yourseln never recognized you.
Under They're very they're very quite honest. They said, after
two years you're finished. You're still will be still alive,
but you're not the same person anymore. So we see
(13:53):
too many people like that. So I never worried about
accusation of my crime. I never did any crime, and
as they also know that. But of course I don't
know if anybody would make some kind of voice for me.
And later found out a lot of people are supporting me.
(14:16):
Of course, so many, so many people supported you, and
uh yeah, it's a it's a hard harsh treatment for
being an outspoken person in a authoritarian country. That's I mean,
it's very very difficult. So many countries in the world
are are going in that direction. Now, what do you
(14:37):
think of that? I would think history always uh teachers lessons,
I would say, and you know, not obviously right or
obviously justice, idea can can be easily achieved. Is always struggle,
(14:58):
is always struggle, and that maybe for too long we
take the liberty and too easy, and we think liberty
can be basal struggle or democracy baslf struggle, which is
not true. I take every generation, every individual, to defending
(15:18):
the human dignity and to defending what we believes, and
that should be a normal condition, and we for too
long we forget about it. You know, it just either
everybody to act on that. It was nine eleven in
the United States. I was such a happy person up
(15:40):
until nine eleven when we suffered the World Trade Center disaster,
and and I thought, you know, I've never been afraid
in my life, and here we go. I was afraid
for the first time. I had to walk down the
streets of New Yorker City that I really loved, and
I had to look up every day to make sure
(16:00):
nothing was going to happen. And then we had an
election of a man who really changed or at least
brought to the forefront, a very very fractured America, and
we're all thinking, now, gosh, our country is not the
same country it was or that we hoped it would be.
(16:21):
And so we're living through a lot of what other
countries in the world are living through. I never thought
we would see it so clearly, but we are having
a very hard time in the United States right now.
Do you agree with me that what's going on is
really sad and dangerous. I think what we see America,
(16:44):
we also have to put in the into the world map,
and you seeing the world changed dramatically with the Russian
invasion to Ukraine, with China's fast development, and also China
has a long strategy trying to make it much more
(17:07):
stronger dominant the world in every aspect. So you'll see
American still struggling with many, many, very fundamental issues of
a human rights and many many issues seems almost like unsolvable.
(17:27):
So the whole political institution of the world is really changing.
It's not a likely in the seventies, eighties or nineties
we are still living a much peaceful time. Yeah, it's
a it's a very different world. And to me, I
do a lot of business in China, we manufacture many
(17:49):
many of our products in China, and China has the
upper hand. I really admired the growth and the extraordinary
innovation of China. But I worry, as you worried, and
as you paid dearly for the authoritarian nature of the government.
(18:09):
And we're just in a very very strange state right now.
And I and this whole thing with the Ukraine, as
you mentioned, is just devastatingly sad. And do you see
that there in England too? Do you get the news? Yes,
of course we The problem is everything happening in front
of us, and we we can get all the informations
(18:34):
at the same time. And I want to make us
feel powerless, you know, we feel almost like impossible to
to do something to help the situation. But still we
have to understand all the power has to come back
to individuals and the world doesn't matter where it goes.
(18:55):
I have to benefit each individual and so so I
take the individual too to act, and the two to
tell people how do you think and and clearly and
also to honestly reflects those feelings it is your expression,
(19:20):
and to communicate, so to make sure they are really
very responsibility for whatever happens in the world your exhibits
(19:40):
that you have created, so many amazing, amazing exhibits. So,
for example, your sunflower seeds. I have my fourteen seeds
that you gave me either way way, can you hear them?
These are your seeds that you gave me from I.
Of course I still have them there, my precious seeds.
(20:02):
I think about you when I look at them, each
seed hand crafted out of porcelain and hand painted by
How many people did it take to make a hundred
million of these porcelain seeds? It picked up all the
one souls and six hundred people working for seven hundred days, wow,
(20:23):
to make all the and and how much did they
weigh when you finally finished making a hundred million seeds?
What did that pile of seeds weigh? What? It's about
a hundred fifty tents tons? Oh my gosh. So so
a ton of everybody is two thousand pounds. That's a
big pile of porcelain. And you exhibited them first at
(20:47):
the Tate Gallery in London. Yes, and the show be
in the Turban Hall in Pig Gallery. I read that
you were in the Originally I saw it, but I
didn't walk in it. I think it was closed off
to walking when I finally got to see it, but
people were allowed originally to walk on the seeds. What
(21:07):
was your message, Well, I want to make something very small.
It looks quite fragile, and but it takes a complicated
message to make it, to like make the highest porcelain
pieces and take about twenty different procedures to to really
make one. But everything handmade. It looked exactly the same,
(21:32):
but none of them can can be identical lead to another.
It's not the same because they all hand depended by once,
all six hundred women, day by day. And you know,
so that is uh fascinating, and I think, and it
(21:52):
looks like an ocean, but none none of those pieces
are the same. Incredible, So that's an exhibit. Then you
did the Forever Bicycles another exhibit in two thousand and seventeen.
Tell us about what the what the twelve D twelve
D bicycles or hundred bicycles. There are several times being
(22:16):
exhibited from maybe twelve hundred to five thousand. You know,
this is several version. I went to the exhibit. I
have a picture here of me at the Hershorn Museum
in Washington that was Yeah, that was two thousand and thirteen.
That was a beautiful exhibit though, thank you. And so
(22:40):
what was the message for the bicycles, Well, bicycle is
something awful everyday objects has already made one. We grew up.
We see bicycles as very luxuries. If you can't have
a bicycle the time I was working in the field,
you have to walk very far away in the desert,
(23:03):
and you know it's not possible to to you know,
scorby desert. You don't have drop over water and there's
no no trees, so it's no shadow you under the sound.
So we always dream to a fault bike. And then
your river crabs thirty two hundred little porcelain red crabs,
(23:28):
reddish and orangesh crabs. What was that about. Well, river
crabs in Chinese have the same name with the color
hormonoous society. Yeah, that means the government sink that society
has to be unified or peaceful. You know, it's kind
(23:51):
of propaganda. And so it's kind of pond because it
sounded the same chis it means the same. So I
used that as some kind of irony or two as
a humor, and everybody online in China understand what I'm
(24:14):
talking about. And then you did the chairs in two
thousand and eleven, a thousand and one beautiful, beautiful um
Chinese antique chairs. What was that about. That's about the
chairs and the chairs is uh as part of our tradition.
(24:39):
Chairs is not as functional as some kind of furniture,
but the rather reflections of Chinese understanding of our society
about family, about this kind of moral or ritual aspect.
So but in the modern days, all those a disappeared,
(25:01):
destroyed people only have a plastic chairs. They you can
buy a plastic chair in exchange for the antique chairs
because antipachers that they're always losing our shaking and it
doesn't look like flashy and but a plastic chair looks
(25:23):
much better. So so you know, the whole society had changed.
The values, the judgment and the tradition disappeared. So that's
why I collects antiques and to try and to learn
from those uh, those older objects or elements. I had
(25:49):
a I have a good friend literally may Pay, who
lives here in the United States. She comes from Western China,
UM and she told me a lot about the struction
of the antiquities during the revolution and how sad it was.
And so she when there's a garage sale or or
(26:09):
an estate sale, she goes to find old Chinese things
to buy because she values them so much she remembers
them from her childhood. And then everything sort of disappeared
and became the plastic chair, and she really admires the
old workmanship and the old and they and they value.
So is does that have something to do with all
(26:30):
of that? Oh? Yes, we are. We are being cut
about from our own memory, you know, tradition. It's about
part of our memory, about our identity to a center
where they come from. And that that is probably the
worst condition. While I'm being cut off format your memory,
(26:54):
so you'll get lost who you are and you don't
know where you come from. So too for me, that's
a struggle to to leave on the memory under to
be too to discover or memories. So do you think
a lot of people who have left China read Chinese
(27:16):
history and try to reassimilate their whole background into the
real history. Well, it's it's extremely difficult because the history
always been rewriting by the modern time, and the China
basins is kind of highly as Subtorian society. A censorshipe
(27:36):
under under changes that the lines and tombs in the history,
so it's very hard to get a real, so called
honest or or special view about what happened in the past.
Is there any history book way way that you could
(27:57):
recommend in English for our listeners to read that you
think does depict the history in a in an accurate fashion.
There's a Every history writer have their own perspective, but
it's always nice to to say that perspective are very
(28:20):
clear and also it's some kind of historical record or proof.
So recently I'm reading a book called The Silk Road,
which is by British and American writer Robert and the
Silk Road as a a very interesting writing in in
(28:48):
re talk about the world history from different perspective. Silk Road.
So everyone look up the book Silk Road and take
take away ways recommendation. What about the zodiac heads? When
(29:14):
I saw those zodiac heads in New York around the
fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel, I was just entranced.
What's the history of that of those particular fantastic zodiac
heads that have animals representing the twelve months. Well, those
(29:34):
animal has zodiacs. I was seeing Ching dynasty in the
in the palace of the King Emperor till French and
British soldiers looted them and a since then disappeared. But
(29:55):
in the recent years about seven of the twelve great
really appeared in the market. So Chinese government encourage people
to buying it back to us. Uh, some kind of
patriotic act, which is a questionable because those rudias are
made for Manchu people. Who is in inventor of China
(30:22):
is not the invader or of China, so I think
that is quite ironic. I made I fixed the one
who is never been found, which are five of them,
so combined with the other sevens as we have a
complete zodiac cat So first time I it's been showing
(30:46):
in the a little fountain in front of Plaza Plaza hotel.
Right that time I am still in the in the detention,
so I completely have no idea those it's going to
be showing, and uh, yeah, it's being showed under the
Mayor Broomberg also give open pulp about me and about
(31:13):
the work, which I think is quitey impressive. It was wonderful,
wonderful Mayor Bloomberg did an incredible job of of letting
us see your work firsthand. It was amazing. And those
are ten foot tall? Where are they now? Where? How
many sets did you make? They are? One set of
(31:35):
them is seeing Lacoma in the Los Angeles Museum. They
permanently collect that, so anybody wants see it, they should
go to LACMA in Los Angeles. And uh, I still
have more exhibits that. I'm so interested in the Olympic
Stadium in two thousand and eight, the Bird's Nest, which
(31:57):
I went to see when it was still under construction,
and you collaborated with Swiss architects Herzog and demoron. What
was that collaboration like And was the conception of a
bird's nest? What? What's the idea there? Well, it's uh,
they hurst them around. They teamed with me because they
(32:18):
know not much about Tiness culture and they know I'm
very interesting architecture and the art. So they come out
this uh concept for the competition. Under they win the competition,
then the whole architecture Burnest is trying to reflect this
(32:42):
kind of openness and the bondness about the modern society.
And of course, uh, you know later being used for
different other purpose. You know, it become a strong propaganda
element for the party. But our decline for the architecture,
(33:03):
I think it's very very strong and very beautiful. It is.
It is such a beautiful stadium. Did and it worked
very well too. Yes, and now you're doing documentaries. A
documentary was just was just shown at a festival in England.
Is that true yours truly? There's a documentary about my
(33:25):
art projects, your truth yours truly showing in this musical
festival in England. Yes, the film is about the show.
In a contrast, it's about how to write postcard to
those political prisoners all over the world. Hundred seventies six
(33:49):
of them, and of course some of them are already
released on most of them are still in jail. Wow,
so we we know how many of there are are?
Do you think there are more than that? There's a
hundred times that we don't know there only know some
noticeable one. Most of them not will be forgotten or
(34:14):
never would come to the public attention. Are you working
on a on a new work now that we should
be anticipating. Uh, well, I'm artists, you know, I am
a self employed I always work. I don't have vacation.
(34:35):
But yeah, but there's nothing I have to do. It's
just it's just some kind of self motivation or you know, well,
you you work in such big numbers for many of
your exhibits. Is there is there something that you're collecting
now or or creating now that have you been commissioned
(34:58):
by another museum somewhere that we should we should know about.
They are not announced, so I cannot announced it. But yes,
there's always had me. Well, we're always looking forward to
um anything that I way way does, and we're just
so proud of to know you and so so happy
(35:20):
that you are obviously thriving living in a community where
you can not only teach and influence but also survive.
Do you have any hopes of ever going back to China? Yes,
every day I want to go back, but still we
have to wait when the situation become more clear. You know,
(35:43):
I kind as my country and I care about it
and know so many and nice sense happening in China.
But of course, uh, I don't want to be putting
in some kind of disappeared Again, that's not a very
good solution for that. Is your studio still there? The
(36:08):
one I visited. I have a student in painting. Yes,
we had also read that a studio of yours in
in Shanghai or somewhere else was destroyed. Is that true not?
It's true in Shanghai and also invaging part of my
studio destroyed. But that's why our normal kind of destroys
(36:28):
many since and they also reviewed the many sense, so
you know it's for something in China is not a
big deal. I It's just so incredible what you have
done and what you have taught us. And I'm just
so pleased to have major acquaintance several times and to
be able to talk to you so intensely about what's
(36:51):
going on with you. You know, we have a lot
of similarities. Food is one. Of course, you cooked me
lunch twice and I I still owe you lunch at
my house to eat from my garden. And I hope
someday you come to the United States and have lunch
here at my farm because I would love to do that.
You also love cats as much as I do. Do
(37:14):
you have any cats there in Cambridge? Have a too
cast in Cambridge and I'll have a new location you
in discipline in their Apple eight pass. And then we
also have prison in common. I hate to bring up
my prison because it was like it was like a
going away to a children's camp compared to what you
(37:37):
had to go through. But incarceration is hideous, enforced incarce incarceration,
And I just want to say that that you have
survived your your tormentors very very well ey way Way,
and I'm very proud of you. It's a horrible thing
to be incarcerated. And America has to revisit their penis
(37:59):
is them as so many countries have to, because it's
just sometimes and many times a very unfair way to
treat humans. And you're an artist, and I think I'm
an artist, and you're outspoken, and I think I'm outspoken.
I'm not outspoken enough, but someday I'll be able to
be a little bit more outspoken, I hope. But you
(38:21):
have You are brave and courageous and uh and really admirable.
Thank you so much for speaking with me today and
um and I hope we get to meet again sometime
in the near future, and good luck with all your
new work. I hope that I'll come to see you
and there it will be the best reason to come
(38:42):
to New York, thank you,
Host
Martha Stewart
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