Artist profile

Ai Weiwei is an artist. Born in 1957, he currently resides and works in Beijing, China. From architecture to installations, social media to documentaries, Ai uses a wide range of mediums as expressions to set up new possibilities and conditions for his audience to examine society and its values.

Taking over the Royal Academy's main galleries in 2015 with his powerful and provocative works, his other recent exhibitions include Evidence at the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin, Ai Weiwei: According to What? at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, Ai Weiwei at Blenheim Palace in Woodstock UK, and @Large: Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz in San Francisco.

Photo: David Parry