Do we like Ai Weiwei?
Our score: 7 out of 10. A long record of risking his own freedom for others, held back by one deleted post and some contested recent views on the West and China.
Ai grew up the son of a poet who was exiled, and that shaped everything since. He became one of the best-known artists in the world, and his best-known cause came after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, when he threw his support behind an effort to collect the names of children who died in collapsed schools.
That cause cost him. In 2011 he was held without charge for 81 days, and Chinese authorities accused him of tax evasion, which he denied. A Beijing court rejected the appeal by his design company against a 15 million yuan penalty in 2012, and his side called it punishment for criticising the government.
The harm check is where it gets complicated. In late 2023 he posted, and later deleted, a message saying guilt over the persecution of Jewish people had at times been used to offset the Arab world. It also called US aid to Israel a good investment, and London's Lisson Gallery cancelled his show over it. Critics called the post antisemitic, and he told The Guardian: “I don't have the intention of an antisemite.”
The Royal Academy then reportedly held a vote on his membership, and its General Assembly decided to take no further action. Ai says he was effectively cancelled and argues free speech has to include opinions people hate. Where you land depends on whether you read the post as clumsy commentary on politics or as a trope about Jewish influence, and plenty of people see it the second way.
The recent turn is the other thing to weigh. In January 2026 he told Reuters the West is “not even in the position to accuse China” over human rights, and he called Keir Starmer's China trip a “very good move”. He also went home to see his mother for the first time in a decade, and described officials as courteous. Critics see that as softening on Beijing; he says Western institutions censor too.
On the stuff the page cares about most, there's nothing from his own mouth against LGBTQ+ people, women or the planet in what we found. We also couldn't find him taking a stand on trans rights, so that's a gap rather than a pass. We didn't check who he has worked with on recent projects beyond the Manchester button show.