Street drama protesting against the arrest of Ai Weiwei (Photo courtesy: Voice of America)
Anchor Marco Werman talks with Lee Ambrozy about Chinese artist and dissident Ai Weiwei. Ambrozy has just translated and published a book on Weiwei’s controversial blogs.
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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI, and WGBH Boston. The US and China wrapped up two days of top level talks in Washington today. The delegations agreed on several trade and business issues, but the US criticized China’s crackdown on dissent. Such criticism is unlikely to lead to the release of Chinese activists such as Ai WeiWei. The outspoken artist disappeared last month. Few if any Americans have worked more closely with Ai WeiWei than American art critic Lee Ambrozy. She lives in Bejing, and she edited and translated the blogs Ai WeiWei posted between 2006 and 2009. Ambrozy does not know where the artist is, but she does not think he has been killed.
Ambrozy: I don’t think–I don’t think that things have become that extreme. Has anyone heard from him? No.
Werman: What is so inflammatory about Ai WeiWei’s work as an artist? You know, he’s quite well known for that famous exhibit at the Tate Gallery in London of sunflower seeds–
Ambrozy: Yes yes.
Werman: Thousands and thousands of sunflower seeds. Is there one thing maybe in his blog that struck you as somewhat revelatory about who he is as an activist?
Ambrozy: Absolutely. After 2008, which was the Olympic year in Bejing, was an important year in China in general. A lot of things transpired. His blogging became very political then. He was a design consultant on the Olympic Stadium.
Werman: Right, the famous Bird’s Nest.
Ambrozy: I think that he felt attaching his name to something that was obviously so political in a sense that it inspired him to start speaking out against things that he didn’t like or that he saw as very hypocritical. And that’s when he started talking about the fake smile of China, and then after that, there was the earthquake, and he did a lot of online activism and organizing.
Werman: And presumably, the Chinese government has been reading his blogs.
Ambrozy: Oh, absolutely. Everything that goes online here is read by many many filtered layers of people who determine the content as ok or not ok, which started happening actually at the end of the blog. One of the last posts was him talking about his discusion with his family in which he shares with them his decision to continue regardless of what the consequences might be. “What can they do to me? Nothing more than to banish, kidnap, or imprison me. Perhaps they could fabricate my disappearance into thin air.” I’m reading that from the book.
Werman: One of his last blog posts in the book. Ai WeiWei’s book.
Ambrozy: Yeah.
Werman: Did Ai WeiWei write something in his blog recently that may have prompted his detention or disappearance?
Ambrozy: No, the blog has been closed since the middle of 2009.
Werman: I see.
Ambrozy: But he was a very active Twitter user, and I think he something like 70,000 followers at the end and was just extremely political. He became sort of a–one of those cornerstone personalities, because he was not afraid to talk about anything or to tweet anything. So if there was ever any sort of sensitive news or anything that you know that you wouldn’t find in let’s say in Sinwa news reports, you could almost be positive that if you read his blog you would find reference to it.
Werman: What is it like for you to translate his work and what have you learned about him do you think by translating his blog?
Ambrozy: I definitely learned a lot about the man himself, just having going over the text so many times because his writing is completely erratic, it’s all over the place. Different styles. You know, various levels of cynicism, irony, sort of literati language, and then he’ll just starting cursing. He’ll just let loose a stream of curses in the same paragraph. By the end of the book translation project, I was so absorbed in his ways of thinking and his mindset, I was just filled with anger everyday. Everything seemed so exposed. Corruption, all of the problems of society were his..
Werman: Indeed. The fact that you translated this book, especially these days with this tough human rights crackdown. That could be viewed as provacative by the Chinese government. Do you have concerns for your own safety?
Ambrozy: I do have a little bit of concern, for instance, doing interviews is probably not a great idea, but I think it’s better to talk about things than to not talk about them. But I say that with an American passport, so I’m very lucky to have an ingrained sense of freedom of speech.
Werman: Well, thanks for speaking with us and telling us more about artist and activist Ai WeiWei. Lee Ambrozy is an American art critic. She’s just edited and translated Ai WeiWei’s blog “Writings Interviews and Digital Rants 2006-2009″. Lee, thanks very much.
Ambrozy: Not a problem. Bye-bye.
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