Ai Weiwei on 'Bubble'

In a rare english interview Ai Weiwei talks about his work 'Bubble', a series of deep blue porcelain balls arranged in lines on Watson Island near Downtown Miami.

The piece featured as one of nine works which made up the Art Projects Exhibition at Art Basel Miami Beach 2008.

Interview by Jean Wainwright.

Bookmark with:

Subscribe to The Art Newspaper Digital Subscription today

More from the Artists section...

Watch a 90 second preview for FREE. For full access signup for a Digital Subscription. Learn more

Massimo Bartolini's Musical Scaffolding

Massimo Bartolini�...

Speaking at Art Basel 2010, Massimo Bartolini explains the concept behind his popular installation, Organi 2007/8 in which he turned a scaffolding str...
Zilvinas Kempinas - Visual Audio Tape

Zilvinas Kempinas - ...

Fair Oasis Lithuanian artist Zilvinas Kempinas created a stir at Art Basel 41 with his floating tape sculpture Oasis generating an odd calm in t...
Franco's Sexual Oppression

Franco's Sexual...

Simon Fujiwara's Spanish Fantasy Baloise Prize winner Simon Fujiwara's piece Welcome to the Hotel Munber (2010) which showed in Art Statements at Art...
Seductive Sculptures - Maria Nepomuceno

Seductive Sculptures...

Victoria Miro artist Maria Nepomuceno attracted attention at Art Statements in Basel this year with her hand made, woven-beaded scultpure Ha...
"It's very large Pointillism"

"It's very...

Billy Childish talks to Jean Wainwright following his highly successful outing to Art Basel 41 in June 2010. Childish became immersed in the...
Chicken Little and the Culture of Fear

Chicken Little and t...

Nancy Chunn, who admits she will probably be the "oldest emerging artist", talks about her Chicken Little and the Culture of Fear works whic...
Souvenir Stalls and Neon

Souvenir Stalls and ...

Doug Aitken talks to Jean Wainwright about his light box photography work, in which he photographed the world's largest souvenir store in Las Veg...
Extreme Performance - Todd Pavlisko

Extreme Performance ...

Todd Pavlisko caused a stir at this year's Volta NY with his performance piece which saw him hammering a nail through his own foot. The piece marked t...
Over The River

Over The River

Christo takes on the Arkansas Famed for projects such as covering the Pont-Neuf Bridge in Paris with 40,000 square metres of fabric and surround...
Doug Aitken - Il Tempo del Postino

Doug Aitken - Il Tem...

Doug Aitken talks to Jean Wainwright about the highly successful performance show Il Tempo Del Postino which took place in Basel last year following i...
Doug Aitken - Playing the Table

Doug Aitken - Playin...

Artist Doug Aitken talks to Jean Wainwright about his musical sculptures in which he adds an extra dimension to an otherwise mundane object. Demonstra...
New dog, old tricks

New dog, old tricks

Mark Lewis Speaking at the 2009 Venice Biennale, Mark Lewis talks about his works generated by digitally capturing rear projected 35mm imag...
Marc Quinn on Self, Sphinx and Saatchi

Marc Quinn on Self, ...

Marc Quinn talks about his Self works - the series of heads created from his own blood - and the mythology that arose from Charles Saatchi's...
Gavin Turk on Which Came First?

Gavin Turk on Which ...

Speaking in front of his work Duck Rabbit, Young British Artist Gavin Turk explores the relationship between which came first (the chicken or the egg)...
Anne Hardy and Incidence

Anne Hardy and Incid...

Anne Hardy talks to Jean Wainwright about her recent work Incidence, taken using a large format camera. Hardy spends a considerable amount of tim...
Grayson Perry - the new Nostradamus?

Grayson Perry - the ...

Grayson Perry Grayson Perry talks about his drawing and print work, specifically his Map of Nowhere, based on the Ebstorf mappa mundi (a Medieval Eur...
Louise Wilson, Oddments room no. 6 and Stanley Kubrick's unmade film.

Louise Wilson, Oddme...

Louise Wilson, who works in collaboration with her twin sister Jane, talks about their work; Oddments room no. 6, on display at the 2009 Frieze art fa...
Grayson Perry - The Seven Ages of Man

Grayson Perry - The ...

Speaking at his current show at the Victoria Miro Gallery in London, Grayson Perry discusses his Walthamstow Tapestry and the techniques and theories ...
Francis Upritchard at the New Zealand Pavillion

Francis Upritchard a...

Sculptor Francis Upritchard showed her work in the New Zealand Pavillion at the 2009 Venice Biennale. Drawing facial expressions and body shapes...
Fiona Tan at the Biennale

Fiona Tan at the Bie...

Fiona Tan talks to Jean Wainwright outside the Dutch Pavillion at the 2009 Venice Biennale about her video works on display at the exhibition. T...
Elmgreen and Dragset at the Biennale

Elmgreen and Dragset...

Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset take over the Nordic and Danish Pavillions at the 2009 Venice Biennale turning them into a study of neighbouring dw...
Stephen Shore - American Surfaces

Stephen Shore - Amer...

Stephen Shore talks to Jean Wainwright about his early works which saw him photographing Andy Warhol in his Factory. With stills from the era, this in...
Mike Nelson interview

Mike Nelson intervie...

Speaking at the 2009 Armory show in New York, Mike Nelson talks about how he's managed to avoid being affected by the recession and discusses his thou...
Shaun Gladwell and Maddest Maximus

Shaun Gladwell and M...

Shaun Gladwell talks to Jean Wainwright at the 2009 Venice Biennale where his work Maddest Maximus is on display in the Australian Pavillion. Influen...
Koons, Rosenthal and Michael Jackson

Koons, Rosenthal and...

Speaking with Norman Rosenthal, before Michael Jackson's untimely death, Jeff Koons talks about his sculpture of the singer and his attempts to meet t...
Tehching Hsieh Performance Works

Tehching Hsieh Perfo...

Tehching Hsieh talks to Jean Wainwright about his endurance performance works, specifically his works which saw him spending an entire year without en...
Stephen Shore - Uncommon Places

Stephen Shore - Unco...

Stephen Shore talks to Jean Wainwright about Uncommon Places, a series of iconic photographs painstakingly taken with a view camera on a trip accross ...
Ewan Gibbs on Goldsmiths College

Ewan Gibbs on Goldsm...

Ewan Gibbs talks about his time at Goldsmiths College and how his early works were taken from surreptitiously sourced holiday brochures. He gives a fr...
Marina Abramovic at the Armory Show

Marina Abramovic at ...

Ahead of her performance piece "The artist is present" due to take place at MoMA in 2010, Abramović talks about her photography, seen on display ...
Sung Hwan Kim, Video and Performance Artist

Sung Hwan Kim, Video...

Speaking in his New York studio and apartment, Sung Hwan Kim discusses the meanings behind some of his video and performance works of the last few yea...
Matthias Schaller 'Vorbild'

Matthias Schaller &#...

Jean Wainwright talks to Matthias Schaller about his works, seen here, in which he photographs palettes used by well known artists such as Cy Twombly ...
Richard Dupont in the VIP lounge

Richard Dupont in th...

Richard Dupont discusses how he came to cast 180 replicas of his own body and place their slightly melted forms in the VIP lounge at the Armory Show t...
Miriam Cabessa at Pulse 2009

Miriam Cabessa at Pu...

Miriam Cabessa took time out from her performance at Pulse this year to talk about how she uses Palestinian Keffiyehs and Jewish Tallitot to create ha...
A life of Endurance - Tehching Hsieh

A life of Endurance ...

Speaking in front of the wooden cage in which he spent an entire year between 1978 and 1979, Tehching Hsieh, or 'Sam' as he is also known, talks about...
Michael Craig-Martin on Goldsmiths

Michael Craig-Martin...

Michael Craig-Martin talks about his time as a teacher at Goldsmiths and describes the issues faced by his students especially the issue of how new ar...
Fia Backström at the Armory Show

Fia Backström a...

Jean Wainwright spoke to Fia Backström at the Armory Show in New York about her work entitled '?!...', comprising wooden painted punctu...
Ewan Gibbs at the Armory Show

Ewan Gibbs at the Ar...

With adaptations of his work adorning the banners and hoardings of the Armory Show this year, Ewan Gibbs had every reason to be pleased that his work ...
The Art of Kenny Scharf

The Art of Kenny Sch...

Having arrived at the Armory Show in a customised golf cart, Artist Kenny Scharf spoke to Jean Wainwright about the artistic influences that have led ...
"It's very hard for an artist" - Anthony Caro

"It's very...

Anthony Caro talks to Anna Somers Cocks about the difficulties artists face through the key stages in their career. Filmed in his studio in late 2008,...
Richard Jackson

Richard Jackson

Richard Jackson talks about Dick's Ducks, a colourful installation which featured on the Hauser and Wirth stand at the 2008 Art Basel Miami Beach...
An Interview with Orlan

An Interview with Or...

In a rare english interview, Orlan talks about her works on display at the 2008 Photo Miami Fair. The works featured Orlan's own clothes arranged...
Ross Lovegrove at Design Miami

Ross Lovegrove at De...

Designer Ross Lovegrove discusses the crossover between art and design and how he is interested in industrial innovation and the development of techno...
The Campana Brothers on design

The Campana Brothers...

Fernando and Humberto Campana make use of found objects to create design art inspired by Brazilian street life and carnival culture. In this interview...
Michael Craig-Martin, Early Years

Michael Craig-Martin...

Michael Craig-Martin talks about his formative years as a young artist studying at Yale in the United States and how he was influenced by the changing...
Untelligent, uninformed public art

Untelligent, uninfor...

Antony Gormley Antony Gormley talks about art in public spaces and how the idea of allocating a portion of new buildings' construction costs to publi...
David LaChapelle on his art and Warhol

David LaChapelle on ...

In an in-depth interview David LaChapelle talks about his first encounter with Andy Warhol at the age of seventeen and how the meeting helped launch h...
Isaac Julien on Western Union Small Boats

Isaac Julien on West...

London based artist Isaac Julien's multiscreen film installation WESTERN UNION: Small Boats, has recently been purchased by Martin Marguilles for...
Ai Weiwei on 'Bubble'

Ai Weiwei on 'B...

In a rare english interview Ai Weiwei talks about his work 'Bubble', a series of deep blue porcelain balls arranged in lines on Watson Islan...
Martin Parr

Martin Parr

Martin Parr talks about his latest project which sees him photographing the rich and famous around the world giving an insightful alternative to the T...
Anthony Caro Full Interview

Anthony Caro Full In...

Sir Anthony Caro has recently finished the greatest commission of his lifetime, the Chapel of Light, which is in the choir of the gothic church of St ...
Julian Opie: A short history of Shahnoza in 3 Parts.

Julian Opie: A short...

A Short film by the Alan Cristea Gallery, supplied to The Art Newspaper.tv by the gallery A pole dancer called Shahnoza is the subject of a new series...
David LaChapelle

David LaChapelle

Anna Somers Cocks talks to Photographer and Film Director David LaChapelle about his most recent exhibition, Jesus is my Homeboy, that has just opened...
"Art has to kidnap the viewer"

"Art has to kid...

Cildo Meireles In 2008 Brazilian artist Cildo Meireles is held his first major UK retrospective at the Tate Modern, exhibiting eight of his large sca...
Antony Gormley on the Hirst Auction

Antony Gormley on th...

Interviewed at the Arts and Islands conference in Guernsey, Gormley talks about Hirst's recent decision to sell his works at auction. The Art Ne...
Anthony Caro and his Chapel of Light

Anthony Caro and his...

Now 84 years old, English sculptor Sir Anthony Caro has just completed the greatest commission of his lifetime, the Chapel of Light, which is in the c...
The People Have The Power

The People Have The ...

Patti Smith on American Politics and Art Patti Smith talks to Anna Somers Cocks about her hopes for America's future and how she has branched out fro...
DJ Spooky

DJ Spooky

Collaborating accross many genres with leading practitioners such as Brian Eno, Moby, Hans Ulrich Obrist and others, DJ Spooky talks about his recent ...
John Gerrard

John Gerrard

Artist John Gerrard talks about his latest piece which refers to the current dependency on oil. The Art Newspaper tv for all the latest art market vi...
Ellsworth Kelly Part 1

Ellsworth Kelly Part...

Anna Somers Cocks talks to veteran American painter Ellsworth Kelly about the main influences of his career. The Art Newspaper tv for all the latest ...
Ellsworth Kelly Part 2

Ellsworth Kelly Part...

In Part 2, Kelly talks about his love of drawing and the important role it has played in his personal development. The Art Newspaper tv for all the l...
Ellsworth Kelly Part 3

Ellsworth Kelly Part...

Kelly recalls his memories of the friendships he formed with some of the 20th century's greatest artists. The Art Newspaper tv for all the lates...
Mustapha Hulusi

Mustapha Hulusi

British Cypriot Mustafa Hulusi discusses the role of the artist at the beginning of the 21st Century against the background of increased interest in t...
Olaf Breuning

Olaf Breuning

One of Europe`s most exciting young artists, now based in New York, gives a candid insight into the motivations and inspirations behind some of his la...