Ai Weiwei challenges artificial intelligence on public screens in eight cities

An unprecedented performance by the great Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, in the context of the CIRCA project – which over the years has seen the collaboration of artists of the caliber of Yoko Ono, Marina Abramović, but also Patti Smith, up to Vivienne Westwood, David Hockney and Anne Imhof —, appears on public screens in eight cities around the world: London, Seoul, Milan (in Piazzale Cadorna), Lagos, Accra, Nairobi, Abidjan and Berlin. Until March 31st, every day from 8.24pm (local time zone), Ai Weiwei will enter the squares of large metropolises, asking 81 questions to artificial intelligence. THE AI WEIWEI PROJECT IN 8 CITIES OF THE WORLD “Who owns who in democratic societies?”  And again: “Which people would benefit most from you in war?”. Some of the questions posed by Ai Weiwei to AI are political (“Can you compile a complete list of all prisoners of conscience in the world?”), others have an existential connotation (“Do human beings crave death?”). With the & nbsp; Ai vs AI project, the artist wants to send a precise message: “If humans are ever freed, it will be because we asked the right questions, not because we provided the right answers,” he explains. And he adds: “It’s not about freedom of expression. It’s about the freedom to ask questions. Everyone has the right.”AI WEIWEI’S 81 QUESTIONS TO AI To create the performance, the artist takes inspiration from the text of the 172 Questions to the Sky, attributed to the Chinese poet Qu Yuan and engraved on the walls of the ancestral temple of Chu about 2300 years ago. The screens will turn on for 81 days, always starting from 8.24pm (local time zone). In fact, Ai Weiwei, a well-known activist and dissident, spent 81 days (also corresponding to the number of questions) spent in a Chinese prison on charges of tax evasion in 2011 (in reality, as is known, the reason for the arrest was an attempt to repress his political commitment). In addition, the questions are accompanied by the animation of a dragon, which announces the year of the Green Wood Dragon (arriving on February 9), which according to Chinese tradition brings with it unpredictable transformations, which require courage and caution.
[Immagine in apertura: Ai Weiwei, Ai vs AI (2023). Courtesy the artist and CIRCA. Photo: BTS Images, Leroy Boateng]