Ai Weiwei Sculpture Purposefully Broken During Exhibition Opening in Italy

A man destroyed a porcelain sculpture by Ai Weiwei seemingly on purpose during the opening reception of an exhibition dedicated to the Chinese dissident artist on Friday evening in Italy.

The destroyed work was Ai’s blue-and-white Porcelain Cube, which was included in a survey on Ai titled “Who am I?” at the Palazzo Fava in Bologna, which opened to the public on Saturday.

Footage of the destruction was captured on CCTV and posted to Instagram by Ai. In the video, the man steps onto the plinth that holds the Cube and pushes it forward, shattering the work. He then lifted up a portion of the broken porcelain over his head. The work was installed in an atrium near the museum giftshop and ticket office.

The Bologna edition of Milan-based daily newspaper Corriere della Sera identified the man as 57-year-old Czech Vaclav Pisvejc, who was stopped by museum security and detained until police arrived. It is still unclear how he entered the museum during the invite-only reception. He was arrested for “destruction, dispersion, deterioration, defacement, soiling and illicit use of cultural or landscape assets,” according to the paper.

Arturo Galansino, the exhibition’s curator and the director general of Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi  in Florence, told Reuters, “Unfortunately, I know the author of this inconsiderate gesture from a series of disturbing and damaging episodes over the years involving various exhibitions and institutions in Florence.”

Pisvejc has previously committed acts of vandalism related to art. In 2018, he attacked the artist Marina Abramović by smashing a painting over her head in Florence, and in 2023, he climbed naked, with the word “Censored” painted onto his body, onto the famed statue of Hercules and Cacus in Florence’s Piazza della Signoria during an award ceremony, according to Corriere.

After seeing the work’s destruction, Ai said, “I hope for his sake that he didn’t hurt himself on the pieces of porcelain,” according to Corriere. The work was removed and covered. A photograph of the unbroken piece is to be placed on view where the work once stood. The exhibition, which runs through next May, opened as planned on Saturday.