All great empires rise gradually: brick by brick, wall by wall, fortress by fortress, war by war, plunder by plunder.
When they fall, they don’t disappear in a puff of smoke. They dissipate slowly and painfully: year after year, decade after decade, century after century, coup after coup, revolt after revolt.
A large grayscale artwork at the entrance to Ai Weiwei’s exhibition reads “The End” What you see is what you see at the Canopy Center for the Arts in New York. it reproduces the end frame great dictator (1940), a film by Charlie Chaplin A parody of Adolf Hitler. With other works depicting the last American soldier leaving Afghanistan, the suspected Nord Stream pipeline explosion in 2022, and a portrait of the murderous WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, it’s clear we’re looking at severe An indictment of empire.
I almost forgot to mention that all the wall pieces in the exhibition are made from toy building blocks (Lego and its Chinese counterpart WOMA). Tens of thousands of images were laid out block by block, line by line, pixel by pixel, hand by hand.
Elsewhere in the exhibition, Ai Weiwei shows A collection of familiar masterpieces from Western art history, each with a highlight. Emmanuel Leutz george Washington wades through climate-induced glaciers on the Delaware River while China looms behind the scenes as the world’s next hegemon. On the far right of Claude Monet’s 650,000-brick version of “Water Lilies,” there’s a mysterious dark void that recalls The artist and his father spent time in gulags and prisons in China. A Warholian interpretation of Leonardo’s The Last Supper (1515-20) sees Ai Weiwei as Judas (“I want to tell people not to believe me,” he told Jane Ursula in an interview Harris) published on the gallery’s website). Giorgione’s 1510 “Sleeping Venus” sleeps next to a coat hanger used for home abortions, while Frank Stella’s 1967 “Harran II” is reimagined in the colors of the Palestinian flag.
It’s been ten years since Ai Weiwei showed off his first piece of toy brick art at the notorious Alcatraz prison outside San Francisco. You can see why he keeps returning to this medium. There is a hint of dialectics Toy blocks symbolize childhood, innocence and play, while also embodying readymade culture, mass production and unbridled consumerism. Ai Weiwei also exploits our illusions about individualism and our shaky notions of authorship in the age of digital reproduction. He gave a middle finger to both empire and the commercial art world. Often, the two are difficult to distinguish.
Ultimately, the show is a tribute to those who have been terrorized and brutalized, directly or indirectly, by world powers and their proxies. It is also a hopeful reminder that whatever they destroy today, we will rebuild tomorrow: brick by brick, wall by wall, house by house, school by hospital, church by church, mosque after mosque, Village after village, city after city. The city breathes and breathes and lives and lives.
What you see is what you see Continue at Faurschou New York (148 Green Street, Greenpoint, Brooklyn) Until February 23, 2025.
