Ai Weiwei - Ai Weiwei: Interlacing

Ai Weiwei – Interlacing is the first major exhibition of photographs and videos by Ai Weiwei – the documenting, analyzing, interweaving artist who communicates via many channels. Ai Weiwei used photography during his New York years, but especially since his return to Beijing, he has incessantly documented the everyday urban and social realities in China, discussing it over blogs and Twitter.

Photographs of radical urban transformation, of the search for earthquake victims, and the destruction of his Shanghai studio are presented together with his art photography projects, the Documenta project Fairytale, and countless blog and cell phone photographs. A comprehensive book, Interlacing, accompanies this exhibition.

Ai Weiwei is a conceptual, socially critical artist dedicated to creating friction with, and forming, reality. He brings life into art and art into life.

Ai Weiwei, October 2010 © Gao Yuan

Imprisoned on April 3rd 2011 by the Chinese authorities because of his political activities, released on bail June 22nd 2011, Ai Weiwei is still, today, banned from leaving the country.

—Jeu de Paume

Ai Weiwei: Interlacing
Curated by Urs Stahel
February 21 - April 29, 2012
Jeu de Paume
1, Place de la Concorde
75008 Paris, France
www.jeudepaume.org

Spring Summer 2008

Illegal street vendors in Tuscany are photographed hiding behind the counterfeit fashion items that the tourists love to buy at bargain prices. Photographs by Gianmaria Gava.

Waking from Dreams of India

Neil Chowdhury visits the towns of his ancestors in India, and tries to come to grips with the confluence of old, new and imagined. The results are intriguing photo-collages.

In the Shadow of Things

This is a strange and wonderful book about a difficult subject: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). The book is the product of the months that photographer Léonie Hampton spent with her mother as together they tried to tackle the irrational rituals and behaviors that were dominating her life.