Ai Wei Wei - Cockroach, 2020
After seeing Ai Wei Wei’s exhibition in Lisbon, most art produced nowadays just seem to be curiosities or empty stylistic exercises. More than ever, Art is needed as a beacon of light in our times.
It exists in order to pose serious questions and to contest the current structures of society and its ruling classes. The world is far from what it could be and we are on a collision course with authoritarianism, for which China is probably its most dangerous proponent. If we are not watchful and take to the streets when necessary, we are in danger of losing freedoms and rights that have been conquered by force on different battlefields throughout centuries.
No government should be able to control their citizens, let alone imprison them and abuse them physically or psychologically. That this is even a possibility is a clear sign of how backwards contemporary global society is and how passive we are becoming. The citizens of Hong-Kong have spoken and they were crushed by Beijing - like cockroaches - while the international community stood still.
The CCP pushes forward. Taiwan will probably be next. With the Belt and Road Initiative, it is already extending its tentacles around the infrastructure of the globe. How long will people be passive? For how long will blood money keep politicians’ mouths shut?
Ai Wei Wei has been for decades a sharp voice denouncing the Chinese regime but he has also extended his action to speak out on injustices and hypocrisies around the world. I believe him to be a role model for the true artists of the future, the ones who will help to create a vision of a new, freer society.
Human rights must be universal, they must be respected everywhere, or else they are meaningless. No country, state, class or religion should be above them.
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"Ai Weiwei’s “Cockroach” (2020) is a documentary film about the protests in Hong Kong in 2019.
In February 2019, the Hong Kong government proposed a bill, which would have allowed extradition of criminal suspects from Hong Kong to face trial in mainland China. The controversial bill sparked immediate outrage over widespread fear of arbitrary detention and politically motivated trials that would decimate Hong Kong’s autonomy under ‘one country, two systems.’ Anti-bill protests escalated into pro-democracy demonstrations.
“Cockroach,” filmed during the height of the protests, captures the extraordinary intensity of an unprecedented era in Hong Kong’s history. Spanning the evolution of the protest movement, it captures street demonstrations, police suppression and violence, and key events, such as the multi-day siege of Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Interviews with Hong Kongers feature activists, protestors, politicians, ordinary citizens, and policemen. Prominent legislators, lawyers and activists articulate the perils of intensifying assaults on freedoms and rule of law.
“Cockroach” is a poignant and dramatic visual record of the final moments of an independent, democratic Hong Kong. On June 30, 2020, China imposed the National Security Law in Hong Kong, effectively ending Hong Kong’s judicial and political independence and placing the city firmly under Beijing’s control".