Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has published a provocative and reflective essay titled “What I Wish I Had Known About Germany Earlier” after Zeit Magazin declined to run it despite commissioning the piece. The text, now available on Hyperallergic, offers Weiwei’s unflinching commentary on German society, bureaucracy, media, and the contradictions within liberal democracies, along with personal reflections on Art.
Ai Weiwei recounts that Zeit Magazin editor Elisa Pfleger invited him to contribute short reflections for a summer issue column, but the piece was later rejected by executive editor Johannes Dudziak. In response, Weiwei released the full article online, where it quickly gathered attention and praise.
In his essay, the artist writes, “A society governed by regulations, yet lacking individual moral judgment, is more dangerous than one with none at all.” He continues, “When conversation becomes avoidance, when topics must not be mentioned, we are already living under the quiet logic of authoritarianism.”
Weiwei also critiques the German media’s reluctance to confront uncomfortable truths: “When public events of great consequence — such as the Nord Stream Pipeline bombing — are met with silence from both government and media, the silence itself becomes more terrifying than any atomic bomb.”
On the topic of art, he writes,
” I still do not know what art is. I only hope that what I make might touch its edges while it seems unrelated to anything. And in truth, in the best of circumstances it is unrelated to me, for the “I” already melts into everything.
Those things found in galleries, museums, and collectors’ living rooms — are they art?
Who has declared them so? On what basis? Why do I always feel suspicion in their presence?
Works that evade reality, that shy away from argument, from controversy, from debate — be they text, painting, or performance — are worthless. And strangely, it is this worthless work that society most readily celebrates.
I understand now: People crave power and tyranny as they crave sunshine and rain, for the burden of self-awareness feels like pain. At times, even like catastrophe.
Under most circumstances, society selects the most selfish, least idealistic among us to take on the work we call “art” because that choice makes everyone feel safe.”
The piece culminates in an introspective and universal tone: “I have no family, no fatherland, never known what it is to belong. I belong only to myself. In the best of circumstances, that self should belong to everyone.”
You can read Ai Weiwei’s full text “What I Wish I Had Known About Germany Earlier” on Hyperallergic here:
cover image: Ai Weiwei, “Study of Perspective – Reichstag, Berlin” (1999) (image courtesy Ai Weiwei Studio)
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