Beschreibung:

Ai Weiwei Circle of Animals / Zodiac Heads 2010 bronze Rat: 293 x 130 x 163 cm (115 3/8 x 51 1/8 x 64 1/8 in.) Ox: 322 x 152 x 157 cm (126 3/4 x 59 7/8 x 61 3/4 in.) Tiger: 310 x 130 x 155 cm (122 x 51 1/8 x 61 in.) Rabbit: 325 x 130 x 150 cm (127 7/8 x 51 1/8 x 59 in.) Dragon: 355 x 158 x 190 cm (139 3/4 x 62 1/4 x 74 3/4 in.) Snake: 299 x 130 x 150 cm (117 3/4 x 51 1/8 x 59 in.) Horse: 302 x 130 x 147 cm (118 7/8 x 51 1/8 x 57 7/8 in.) Ram: 310 x 154 x 156 cm (122 x 60 5/8 x 61 3/8 in.) Monkey: 300 x 130 x 130 cm (118 1/8 x 51 1/8 x 51 1/8 in.) Rooster: 380 x 130 x 150 cm (149 5/8 x 51 1/8 x 59 in.) Dog: 310 x 130 x 165 cm (122 x 51 1/8 x 64 7/8 in.) Boar: 312 x 130 x 175 cm (122 7/8 x 51 1/8 x 68 7/8 in.) This work is number 1 from an edition of 6 plus 2 artist’s proofs. Each Zodiac head is accompanied by an individual certificate of authenticity signed by the artist.
Provenance Private Collection Exhibited Sao Paulo Biennale, Pavilhão Ciccillo Matarazzo, 25 September - 12 December 2010 (Present lot exhibited) London, Somerset House,The Fountain Court, 12 May 2011- 26 June 2011 (another example exhibited) New York, Pulitzer Fountain, Central Park, 4 May 2011 - 15 July 2011 (Present lot exhibited) Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 20 August 2011 - 12 February 2012 (Present lot exhibited) Taipei, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, 29 October 2011 - 29 January 2012 (another example exhibited) Houston, Hermann Park, 25 February - 1 June 2012 (another example exhibited) Kiev, Ukraine, Ukrainian Biennale of Modern Art, 17 May - 31 July 31, 2012 (another example exhibited) Washington, Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden, 21 June 2012 - 9 August 2012 (Present lot exhibited) Pittsburgh, The Andy Warhol Museum & Carnegie Museum of Art, 1 October 2012 - 31 December 2012 (another example exhibited) Miami, FL Perez Art Museum, 3 December 2013 - 16 March 2014 (another example exhibited) Cleveland, OH, Cleveland Museum of Art, 27 July 2013 - 16 March 16 2014 (another example exhibited) Mexico City, Museo Nacional de Antropología, 15 August 2014 - 30 November 2014 (another example exhibited) Literature S. Delson, ed., Ai Weiwei Circle of Animals, London: Prestel, 2011, (illustrated in colour throughout) Catalogue Essay Underpinning Ai Weiwei’s practice is an investigation into the relation between history and value. Creating work that is by turns iconoclastic and regenerative, he recognises that an object’s significance is always subject to change. Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads is a towering expression of this sensibility, both ludic and highly serious. Aware of ambiguities, of tensions, and of conflicts, the piece responds with fierce intelligence to the complexities of Sino-European history. Modelled on a series of eighteenth century sculptures, the zodiac heads have a specific point of reference. The original pieces belonged to the Emperor Qianlong’s Garden of Perfect Brightness in the palace of Yuanming Yuan, where they formed part of a decorative clock fountain. Designed by the Italian Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione and representing the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac, they exist at a cross-cultural intersection. The ‘realistic’ treatment of feather and fur is at odds with traditional Chinese modes of stylisation; as Weiwei puts it ‘the style is very interesting – Chinese, but mixed. It is a Western understanding of a Chinese way.’ (Ai Weiwei ‘My Work is Always a Readymade,’ Ai Weiwei Circle of Animals, Munich, New York, London: Prestel Publishing, 2011, p. 51). From this point of inception grew a narrative fraught with tension. In 1860, during the final year of the Second Opium War, the heads were among a vast haul of loot removed by British and French troops and taken to Europe. The general who ordered the sacking of the palace was James Bruce 8th Earl of Elgin – son of the Elgin who so famously removed the Parthenon statues which remain in the British Museum to this day. As icons of a critical moment in China’s ‘Century of Humiliation,’ a period characterised by violent imperialist intervention, the heads have become loaded with resonance. A source of ongoing resentment, their contentious status has only been heightened by recent appearances at auction in New York, Hong Kong and Paris. Today only seven of the original twelve are known to exist. Recasting the heads in bronze, as in the present lot, and also in a smaller gold-plated series, Ai is interested in fullness. His revisionary impulse is inflected by the addition of the missing heads, (re)constructing a putative whole. As he avers, ‘without twelve, it’s not a zodiac. So the idea was first, to complete it, and more important, to complete it the way I think it should be. Then that becomes solid, because I did it. The new event of my twelve zodiac heads becomes a new factor.’ (Ai Weiwei ‘My Work is Always a Readymade,’ Ai Weiwei Cir