Chinese artist Ai WeiWei

Not my Typical Family Post.

The Chinese artist Ai WeiWei is one of those unique figures in history who can straddle art and politics.

The best example of his ability to blend art and politics was when he campaigned against the official reaction to the Sichuan earthquake in 2008 – which was to suppress news about the deaths and the shoddy building codes. He led the effort to gather the names of school children who died in the quake. He then created a giant art work in Munich made up of children’s colorful backpacks. The worked spelled out the words of one mother whose child was killed: “She lived happily for seven years in this world.”

http://articles.cnn.com/2011-04-09/opinion/ai.weiwei.art.freedom_1_human-rights-chinese-government-china-s-sichuan?_s=PM:OPINION

Mr. Ai has come to see his escalating conflict with government officials over the Communist Party’s authoritarian rule as performance art. 

In November, he spread the word that he was throwing a river crab feast at the studio to protest the destruction order. The word for river crab, hexie, sounds nearly identical to the word for harmony, which the Communist Party claims to promote; the party’s critics like to say censors are “harmonizing” the Internet and other forms of media.