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Stool

Ai Weiwei Chinese
ca. 2007
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
Using traditional woodwork techniques, Ai reconfigures pieces of furniture in ways that render them inoperative. This visually playful work questions the way in which modernization has made China’s past inaccessible and whether, in seeking to perpetuate tradition by adapting inherited forms, one instead distorts it irrevocably.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Stool
  • Artist: Ai Weiwei (Chinese, born Beijing, 1957)
  • Date: ca. 2007
  • Culture: China
  • Medium: Wood
  • Dimensions: 43 × 34 × 48 in. (109.2 × 86.4 × 121.9 cm)
  • Classification: Sculpture
  • Credit Line: Lent by a private collection, Hong Kong
  • Rights and Reproduction: © Ai Weiwei
  • Curatorial Department: Asian Art