Camera with Plint

Following Ai Weiwei’s 81 days under secret detention, he was released on bail with strict restrictions. His passport was confiscated, he was barred from leaving Beijing for a year, and he was told to avoid speaking to the media. In addition to those restrictions, Ai noticed more than twenty surveillance cameras were installed all around his studio house in Caochangdi, Beijing. Camera with Plinth monumentalizes in marble the surveillance camera, symbolic of the pervasive nature of surveillance in most societies today. The camera sits atop a pedestal that is modeled after a Yuan Dynasty oil lamp in the artist’s personal collection.