‘So Sorry’, the title of Ai Weiwei’s exhibition, refers to the thousands of apologies expressed recently by governments, industries and financial corporations worldwide, in an effort to make up for tragedies and wrong doings – though often without shouldering the consequences or the desire to acknowledge let alone repair. Saying sorry – or not saying it – is in the headlines everywhere and thus also in China. It seems, however, that the expression ’sorry’ has taken on the meaning of ‘fuck off’. Since to apologise also means that it is too late to make amends. Do we really want to buy into ’so sorry’? And should we not find new ways to say sorry and to express our regrets? Do we need a different culture of apologising?

The exhibition ends on January 17th, only a few days left to go there!
And you should attend one of the guided tours (they’re free)!

Guided tour/ German
Mo – Sa 18:30, So 14:00 + 15:30 + 18:30
Guided Tour/ English
Fr 18:30

Ai Weiwei – So Sorry
Haus der Kunst
Prinzregentenstrasse 1, Munich
http://www.hausderkunst.de/

‘liberty is about our rights to question everything.’ (ai weiwei)
ai weiwei (*1957) is regarded as one of the most important contemporary artists in china. his project ‘fairytale’ was a highlight at the 2007 documenta in kassel and brought him international fame: for ‘fairytale’ he flew in 1001 chinese; they became part of the exhibition and their experiences part of the art. it was the largest project ever created for the documenta. together with the swiss architects herzog & de meuron, ai weiwei conceived of the national stadium for the olympic games in beijing in 2008 – the so-called ‘bird’s nest’ is already considered a landmark of the chinese capital.
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besides several familiar works in different media, ai weiwei also shows two new works in so sorry that were produced especially for the haus der kunst. ‘remembering’, for example, a work for the haus der kunst’s façade, is ai weiwei’s memorial to the earthquake that took place in the chinese province of sichuan in 2008. the installation consists of 9,000 backpacks in five different colours that make up the sentence ‘for seven years she lived happily on this earth’ in chinese lettering – a sentence with which a mother of one of the earthquake victims commemorated her daughter.
ai weiwei severely criticises china’s political leadership and demands an end to censorship. in august he was briefly arrested because of his political activities. his internet blog, where he also published the names of the Sichuan victims, amongst which were 5,000 school children, has been shut down several times. upon the haus der kunst’s invitation, ai weiwei writes in the exhibition’s blog in english for the first time.

http://aiweiwei.blog.hausderkunst.de/

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 14th, 2010 at 08:16 and is filed under Exhibitions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.