Ai Weiwei returns to Switzerland for extensive exhibition of his latest works

In a new exhibition, he returns to Switzerland, where Bernard Fibicher, director of the Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts de Lausanne curates at mcb-a. For this show, Ai Weiwei is throwing a party, with works spilling out of the exhibition rooms into the Palais de Rumine’s public spaces and the museums of archaeology and history, zoology, geology, and money, as well as the State and University Library.

Running until 28 January 2018, the exhibition Ai Weiwei: D’ailleurs c’est toujours les autres is bringing together more than 40 items dating from 1995 up to the present: works in porcelain, wood, marble, jade, crystal, bamboo, and silk, together with wallpaper, photographs and videos, all testifying to the rich variety of the artist’s work and his profound knowledge of his country’s cultural heritage.

At the same time, in a playful or iconoclastic way, he rechannels his traditional motifs, methods and materials into a critique, overt or covert, of the Chinese political system. His most recent works bear on the troubling complexity of international matters including economic dependency and refugee flows.

The mcb-a event promises to be a true all-rounder: a remarkable visual artist, an encyclopedic mind, a gifted transmitter of ideas and a man coming to grips with the major issues of today’s world.

For more information visit www.mcba.ch.

Main image: With Wind, 2014, bamboo and silk, approx. 240 x 5000 cm. © Studio Ai Weiwei