Ai Weiwei: Aftershock

MAXXI L’Aquila is hosting Ai Weiwei: Aftershock curated by Tim Marlow, director and CEO of the London Design Museum, and backed by the City of L’Aquila.

This solo show features the work of Chinese artist, architect and activist Ai Weiwei, a global pioneer in contemporary art. It also pays tribute to L’Aquila as the capital of Abruzzo and its recent history, marking the year of its being chosen as the Italian Capital of Culture. 

Ai Weiwei: Aftershock is arranged as a dialogue between the artist and Palazzo Ardinghelli, the baroque palace housing the museum and one of the most successful examples of building restoration and repurposing after the 2009 earthquake in L’Aquila. The show features a series of powerful works created after the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan and dedicated to the memory of its losses. One of these works is Straight, a seminal piece for Ai Weiwei that is being shown in L’Aquila for the first time in three different spaces. This sculpture, like the other works in the exhibition, underscores the lasting impact of natural catastrophes and human-generated conflicts, highlighting themes such as corruption and tragedy. It celebrates human resilience and the power of the drive to create.

The exhibition includes almost seventy works, some of them displayed for the first time in a museum, spanning Weiwei’s entire artistic career: installations, videos, photographs, sculptures conceived as paintings and iconic subjects by artists like Munch, Van Gogh and Ed Ruscha re-interpreted using toy bricks to create complex, imaginative forms. Weiwei uses a variety of materials (from steel, porcelain and marble gathered from the rubble to everyday objects) and creative processes (from traditional techniques to carvings in precious materials and constructions) to transform traditional value systems. He experiments, connects, collects, recycles and invents in a way that is never just a pure exercise in form. Through variety and the subversion of traditional values, he encourages us to look at the world from different points of view. Weiwei’s work is rooted in his personal experience, yet its significance is universal.