{"id":20637,"date":"2013-09-15T18:03:29","date_gmt":"2013-09-15T22:03:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artoronto.ca\/?p=20637"},"modified":"2013-09-20T21:46:06","modified_gmt":"2013-09-21T01:46:06","slug":"first-thursday-at-the-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/?p=20637","title":{"rendered":"First Thursday at the AGO"},"content":{"rendered":"

First Thurday<\/strong>
\n September 5, 2013<\/strong>
\nArt Gallery of Ontario<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

An (un)expected block by the Chinese government prevented Ai Weiwei from joining a boisterous crowd of fans at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Chinese international censorship aside, the popular First Thursdays at the AGO arranged to have Ai Weiwei and AGO\u2019s director and CEO\u00a0Matthew Teitelbaum discuss art, politics, and exile via satellite chat.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>AGO\u2019s director and CEO\u00a0Matthew Teitelbaum\u00a0at the video chat<\/p>\n

The interview was broadcast to a packed room of partygoers with special interview passes. For those who couldn\u2019t get the coveted passes it was projected to an overflow audience in the beautiful Walker Court. Teitelbaum\u2019s questions provoked discussions about the role of art in political protest, the meaning of exile, and Weiwei\u2019s seemingly hereditary propensity for dissent.\u00a0To listen to\u00a0the video chat\u00a0please go to:\u00a0http:\/\/www.ago.net\/5701<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Ai Weiwei is all smiles in AlvinHamilton Rm. in Bejing<\/p>\n

The most probing question, though, was asked by Canada\u2019s former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson who inquired whether Weiwei\u2019s art and political stance would have been different if he had not lived in an oppressive, totalitarian state.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Canada\u2019s former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson on the screen<\/p>\n

Polaris-prize winning band Fucked Up<\/em> served a fitting coup de gr\u00e2ce to state censorship. On a stage in Walker Court, they ripped apart the polite dinner conversations that followed the interview.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Fucked Up<\/em> on stage with\u00a0live visuals by Tasman Richardson<\/p>\n

Text and Photo: Damir Malteric<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

September 5, 2013<\/p>\n

Art Gallery of Ontario<\/strong><\/p>\n

Chinese international censorship aside, the popular First Thursdays at the AGO arranged to have Ai Weiwei and AGO\u2019s director and CEO Matthew Teitelbaum discuss art, politics, and exile via satellite chat.<\/p>\n

Read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20640,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-events","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20637"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20643,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20637\/revisions\/20643"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v2.artoronto.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}