Alison Klayman's Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (2012) rocks much more than the slow boat to China. Ai Weiwei and his crew hold high the torch of liberty in the People's Republic, a dangerous proposition given the authoritarian government and its clumsy, sporadically brutish crackdowns on freedom of expression.
Ai conducts his activities in a range of forms and formats, ranging from 3D installations to photography, from information-gathering to distribution via the internet -- most notably via Twitter.
Klayman's film's edge exhibits sharpness through in-country footage and audio, text and image.
Ai gives the finger to whatever he thinks calls for it, literally, but he also directs attention to things like suppression of basic facts, as in the wake of the 2008 Sichuan / Szechuan earthquake. Simply posting the names of the dead becomes an act of defiance. Imagine in the US, suppressing the names of the dead in the aftermath of a catastrophe exacerbated by human neglect or ineptitude -- say, after Katrina or during the latest Iraq War, and simply posting them against the wishes of "authorities."
There are consequences to Ai's art. Internationally, he receives praise and support, but nationally, he is harrassed, physically hurt and imprisoned, his studio attacked. Outrageous.
Ai Weiwei deserves the Voltaire Freedom of Expression Award (especially if such exists -- if not, it should). So does his crew, so do his in-country supporters. And Alison Klayman deserves a lot of credit for showing them in action, and the crackdown, and the art, and the context. An excellent, absorbing documentary, such is Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry.
Today's Rune: Warrior.
2 comments:
Every country needs more like this fellow.
Erik, just the name alone is a trip!
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