Since 1993, Beijing-based Ai Weiwei has created a cohesive body of work in the various guises of artist, architect, curator, writer and critic. This overview, an in-depth reflection on the artist's most vibrant and celebrated projects, features works from 2004-2007--including installation projects, objects and videos. Focusing on thematic topics, materials and media, it includes screenshots from Ai's influential blog, as well as a discussion of his infamous social sculpture "Fairytale," which debuted at 2007's Documenta 12, inviting 1,001 Chinese citizens to participate in hopes of finding, "a way to bring China's current social condition to Kassel and thus allow Westerners to view a sample of modern Chinese society." Ai's most recent wood and porcelain series is also featured here, positing a new understanding of traditional Chinese forms, aesthetics and production. This publication includes texts by Charles Merewether, Peter Pakesch and Philip Tinari.
The son of the famous Chinese poet Ai Qing, Ai Weiwei was born in 1957 in Beijing. He collaborated with the Swiss architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron on the design for the Beijing National Stadium for the 2008 Summer Olympics.

Maria Lassnig (1919–2014) is internationally recognized as one of the most important painters of the 20th and 21st centuries. The leitmotif of her painting, the act of rendering her “body awareness� visible found additional expression in film in the early 1970s. During her time in New York, Lassnig studied animation at the School of Visual Arts and began to film in 8mm and 16mm. While several of these New York films have long since been part of her canonical works (e.g. Selfportrait, Iris, Couples, Shapes), many remained unfinished. These "films in progress" can be regarded as autobiographical notes as well as an artistic experiment featuring many of Lassnig’s recognizable sujets and methods. In 2018, this filmic legacy was restored and in many cases completed according to Lassnig’s original concept and instructions by two close collaborators, artists Hans Werner Poschauko and Mara Mattuschka, and presented to great international acclaim. This German-language publication provides the first comprehensive index of Lassnig’s film works, offering insight into the filmmaker’s world of ideas through a wide selection of Lassnig’s own previously unpublished notes. It also includes a selection of Lassnig's "films in progress" on DVD. Two essays by James Boaden and Stefanie Proksch-Weilguni place Lassnig’s work in the context of the US-American film avant-garde of the 1970s, while conversations with Mara Mattuschka, Hans Werner Poschauko and the restoration team shed a light on the rediscovery of Lassnig’s fascinating films.