15 Reasons We're Thankful for Ai Weiwei

Image via Complex Original

Ai Weiwei loves cats. Anyone who follows the Chinese dissident artist on Instagram will have picked up on this because he posts multiple cat photos a week. Apparently the artist lives with some 40 or so felines at his home and studio in Beijing, including the red tabby that frequently appears in Ai's grams and Alison Klayman's 2012 documentary Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry. At the beginning of the film, the artist even touches briefly on his fascination with cats, noting that unlike people, cats never close the doors behind them.

Although you won't find photos of Ai Weiwei making the duckface on Instagram, he takes a slew of hilarious selfies and gives no fucks as to what you think about them. In some of these self-portraits, for instance, he's stunting on a bicycle, or he's rocking a pair of goofy-looking sunglasses. In others, he's cruising through life, shirtless and unapologetic.

Behold, the selfie of all Ai Weiwei selfies. Ai snapped this photo inside a Chengdu elevator literally as the Chinese authorities were arresting him. It has since gone on to be displayed inside art museums around the world.

Essentially everything Ai Weiwei does is his way of challenging authority, particularly the Chinese government. This sentiment is obvious in his famous “Perspective” photo series, which shows the artist flipping off buildings such as The White House, the Eiffel Tour, and Tiananmen Square. Earlier this year, the artist released a video, asking for his passport back and demanding to know why it was taken in the first place. And it was his investigation into the student deaths and causalities that occurred during the 2008 Sichuan earthquake that landed him on the Chinese authorities' watch list in the first place. Even after being imprisoned for 81 days and having his passport confiscated, Ai continues to call out his native country on the political injustices he and his countrymen have suffered at its hands.

Back in June, Ai Weiwei posted a picture of himself with his leg held up like a rifle, ultimately creating a viral photo trend. For months, Ai's followers mimicked the pose in their own selfies, which Ai then regrammed. While the artist has never explained the meaning behind these photos, its likely Ai was making a tongue-in-cheek reference to a move done by dancers in the old, pro-communist ballet The Red Detachment of Women.

Before Ai Weiwei had 254 thousand followers on Twitter, he also had a rather large following on Sina Weibo, a Chinese microblogging website. After Sina invited Ai to start his own celebrity blog on Weibo back in 2005, the artist became something of a blogging pioneer, really connecting with his followers and using the blog to open conversations. In fact, he even used his Weibo to collect donation money from his fans to crowdsource the $2.4 million tax bill he received from the government. Needless to say, that didn't sit too well with the Chinese authorities, who proceeded to shut down his blog.

Judging from the many photos of him and his son, Ai Weiwei seems like a great dad. For those who don't know, Ai has a son named Ai Lao, who was born out of wedlock not long before Alison Klayman began filming her documentary on Ai's life. “When I met Ai Weiwei, his son was born may be two months later,” she said in an interview. “… But it took a while for him to allow me to film him with his son. He wasn’t sure that at such a young age, whether he wanted me to film [the son].”

Ai Weiwei is quite the hairdresser, depending on who you ask. Apparently, he has given hundreds of haircuts in his lifetime. We first saw Ai Weiwei trim someone's hair in Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, but he occasionally documents his handiwork on Instagram, too. The handsome fellow you see above is sporting a look by the artist-turned-barber.

Some people refuse to have their hair cut by anyone but a professional. Ai Weiwei, however, isn't afraid of experimenting. He somehow manages to own a look, even when he has a terrible cut.

The only thing funnier and more poignant than Psy's “Gangnam Style” music video is Ai Weiwei's parody. In Ai's low-budget rendition, we see the artist trotting around in a pink shirt, waving a pair of handcuffs in the air. Ai's facial expression and the way he's flailing his arms, paired with the music and visuals from the original video, makes for a perfect satire. He even gave his video a cheeky title, “Grass Mud Horse Style” which sounds similar to “Fuck your mother” in Chinese; it's his way of indirectly brushing off government censors.

Despite the fact that Ai Weiwei is confined to the borders of China, he still does a good job of keeping up with his international fanbase via social media. Although it would be impossible for anyone of Ai Weiwei's stature to respond to all the messages he receives, he's constantly retweeting and regramming photos and words from his fans. In fact, he currently has 254 thousand followers on Twitter, which he once called his “favorite city” in an interview with Foreign Policy.

Ai Weiwei is no stranger to corrupt authority, but he has also created works that draw attention to others who have suffered at the hands of the police. One such example is his immersive piece, Ye Haiyan's Belongings, which was on view inside his “According to What?” exhibition at Brooklyn Museum this summer. In July 2013, Chinese authorities arrested a feminist activist, Ye Haiyan. She was ordered to pack all of her family's belongings, forcibly removed from her home, and then abandoned on the side of the road. When Ai found out about Ye's story, he photographed everything she owned, eventually turning the photos into wallpaper that covered one room inside the Brooklyn Museum.

Also on view inside Ai Weiwei's “According to What?” exhibition was Stay Home, his documentary about a woman who demands that the government provide better care for its people. It centers on the woman, Liu Ximei, who contracted HIV at the age of 10 and later developed AIDS.

In the past, Ai Weiwei has said that his relationship with his Twitter followers is closer than kinship. “Twitter is my city, my favorite city. I can talk to anybody I want to. And anybody who wants to talk to me will get my response. They know me better than their relatives or my relatives,” he told Foreign Policy. You can tell he cares about his fans from how often he retweets their “#flowersforfreedom” photos and shares photos of fan tattoos like the one above.

Seriously. Look how happy he looks dancing to “Gangnam Style.”