February 7 - March 15, Lisson Gallery

For those that are familiar with Ai Weiwei, many words come to mind when thinking about the artist and his work. Daring, witty, painstakingly detailed while simultaneously simple and direct. Ai Weiwei: A New Chatpter at Lisson Gallery is no exception to these descriptors. The exhibition presents an array of the renowned artist's recent explorations in contemporary art. His work is tactile, from a Lego-encased porcelain lion to ornately sewn buttons on World War II military stretchers that spell an organized, emphatic expletive. What is censorship? How can artists mimic modern technologies such as generative AI in distorting and even altering both historical and art historical narratives? A New Chatpter is the artist’s continued exploration of these questions, although his mode of expression seems to be a genesis of medium and tools.

Perhaps the most conspicuous piece throughout the gallery is Ai Weiwei’s reinterpreted version of Gaugin’s Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?. The piece is strikingly identical to the original in scale and accuracy, which is exceedingly impressive considering the composition is fully constructed of Lego-bricks. With closer observation, however, the artist has altered the original in the addition of a self-portrait in the bottom left-corner, a bubblegum pink bomber jet in the upper-center, and a matching sickly-sweet pink atomic explosion in the yellow right-hand corner. The piece is a critique of the destruction of Hiroshima during World War II, the message cleverly woven into the famed Post-Impressionist piece. It is a covert historical commentary gelled into an art-historical work that itself has been critiqued for its colonial message– a critique within a critique. Gaugin’s appropriation of Tahiti and its aboriginal people is a growing conversation when revising the canon of Western art history, so it is also interesting to note that the artist has included himself as one of the depicted aboriginal peoples. The use of Legos as a medium is seen throughout the gallery. The small plastic bricks pixelate a gaze: they confuse, the reinterpret, they conceal. Even in photos the pieces are distorted–they are not as they appear when viewed in person.

The works are curated sporadically, and feel almost like an intimate visit within the artist’s studio. While there is not necessarily a sense of narrative strung throughout the rooms of the gallery, the artist’s hand of ornate precision is still evident within each piece, from carefully placed plastic bricks to meticulously arranged repurposed buttons. Every work within the show is a statement— a reminder that the artist, despite governmental effort, is an artist of persistence and constant investigation of his craft. He will always find ways to serve as a mirror to his audience, to hold up a reflective surface to us so that we may choose to find moments of reflection despite the contemporary landscape’s often jarring, hasty, and ever-evolving nature.

Ai Weiwei: A New Chatpter is on until the 15th of March at Lisson Gallery in Marylebone, London.

Ai Weiwei: A New Chatpter

February 7 - March 15, Lisson Gallery

Woo Jung Ghil: Savouring Silence

Christina Kimeze: Between Wood and Wheel