Lisson Gallery and Ai Weiwei announce date for exhibition

28 March 2024

Lisson Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of works by Ai Weiwei in early 2025.

This show – the artist’s eighth with the gallery – will focus on his use of Lego bricks (or the Chinese equivalent, called Woma) as a highly adaptable and resonant medium for ambitious image-making. Beyond their essential Duchampian gesture – combining playfulness with the readymade – the works in this exhibition take on a more complex relationship with accepted pictorial traditions and techniques, depicting controversial or disputed episodes of recent history through the use of an ephemeral, seemingly innocent material. Ai has written on his interest in the collision of subject and medium, citing the influences of Roman mosaic-makers and Chinese ink painters, through to the current day digitisation and fragmentation of authorship and, indeed, of contemporary existence. As a whole, this body of work reflects upon the real and present struggles between self and state, source and copy, information and conspiracy, painting and pixel.

Ai Weiwei’s CIRCA project '81 Questions' continues until 31 March. Major institutional exhibitions will take place this year in Austria and Spain.

Greg Hilty, Curatorial Director at Lisson Gallery, stated that "At a time of tragically growing divisions and conflict between peoples, we will continue to present work that offers our audiences a shared space of creativity and enquiry. This space demands a commitment to open artistic expression alongside fundamental respect for individuals and communities globally. Ai Weiwei's latest work proposes bold, engaging and empathetic visions that both confront and re-imagine our complex world."

Ai Weiwei says, "Artistic expression stands as a fundamental attribute of human existence, with artists fulfilling their inherent responsibility through their endeavors. Amidst the divisive trends prevalent in today's world, time will tell that humanitarianism and humanity will ultimately underpin all our disagreements. Without a fundamental respect for life, these disputes would lose their significance and purpose."

Ai Weiwei's lego work, Zodiac Dragon (Turquoise) (2018), as seen above, is presented at Lisson Gallery's Art Basel Hong Kong booth, from 28–30 March 2024.