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For the first time in its 90-year history, SAM is presenting the work of one artist at all three of its locations at the same time. In addition to the major retrospective at the downtown location, the Seattle Asian Art Museum presents Ai Weiwei: Water Lilies (March 19, 2025–March 15, 2026), a reinterpretation in LEGOs of one of Claude Monet’s famed water lilies paintings. The Olympic Sculpture Park presents Ai Weiwei: Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (Bronze) (May 17, 2025–May 17, 2027), a circle of 12 monumental bronze sculptures. This offers a unique opportunity to engage deeply with Ai Weiwei’s work in different contexts across the city.Ai Weiwei creates art that may be considered provocative or sensitive in nature. Some works address themes of social, political, and human rights issues or include explicit language or other elements that could be upsetting for some audiences.
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"Ai, Rebel: The Art and Activism of Ai Weiwei"
Mar 12–Sep 7 2025
Seattle Art Museum
“Everything is art. Everything is politics.” Globally renowned artist Ai Weiwei (Chinese, b. 1957) is celebrated as a disruptor of artistic canons and a champion of free expression. In his work—ranging across performance, photography, sculpture, video, and installation—he deploys humor and provocation, calling upon his viewers to examine history, society, and culture. Organized by SAM, Ai, Rebel: The Art and Activism of Ai Weiwei highlights the artistic strategies of his 40-year career for questioning forms of power. It marks the artist’s first US retrospective in over a decade and his largest-ever US exhibition.
Ai, Rebel explores over 130 works created over four decades, from the 1980s to the 2020s, offering visitors a rare opportunity to engage with the conceptual artist’s wide-ranging body of work. Iconic works from his career are on view, including Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn (1995), Study of Perspective (1995–2011), Sunflower Seeds (2010), Neolithic Vase with Coca Cola Logo (Gold) (2015), and Illumination (2019). The exhibition also features several works making their international debut.
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"Ai Weiwei: Water Lilies"
Mar 19 2025–Mar 15 2026
Seattle Asian Art Museum
Nearly 50 feet in length and made from 650,000 LEGO blocks, Ai Weiwei’s Water Lilies (2022) is the artist’s largest and most ambitious LEGO work to date. This reinterpretation of Claude Monet’s iconic triptych from the Museum of Modern Art in New York offers an equally immersive experience, merging the lush beauty of Monet’s water lilies with Ai’s personal history.
Visitors can experience this work—displayed in one long panel on a single wall—up close in an intimate gallery at the Seattle Asian Art Museum. This is the first time this work has been shown in the US; it debuted in 2023 at the Berlin art gallery neugerriemschneider.
The piece has a connection with the Seattle Art Museum’s history. An actual Monet Water Lilies work was loaned to the museum in 1956 by Walter P. Chrysler Jr., who purchased it from the Monet estate and toured it around the United States. The painting was displayed in the Fuller Garden Court of the Seattle Asian Art Museum, the original home of the Seattle Art Museum.
Special funding for this installation provided by Jeffrey* and Susan Brotman, Jon and Mary Shirley Foundation, Scan Design Foundation, and Walker Family Fund.
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"Ai Weiwei: Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (Bronze)"
May 17 2025–May 17 2027
Olympic Sculpture Park
Standing over 10 feet tall and weighing over 1,500 pounds per piece, Ai Weiwei’s Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (Bronze) (2010) consists of 12 zodiac head sculptures. These remarkable works are installed in the Ackerley Meadow, an area of the sculpture park just outside of the PACCAR Pavilion. They are arranged in an arcing semi-circle and in order of the traditional Chinese zodiac cycle: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Ram, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, and Boar. Visitors can get up close and walk among the sculptures.
The works reconceive 12 zodiac heads that once decorated an 18th-century Qing imperial fountain before they were looted during the Second Opium War (1856–1860). Seven are based on the original heads that have survived, and Ai researched and reimagined the five animals still missing to complete the zodiac. This work embodies Ai’s long engagement with questioning the tendency to value the real over the fake and the original over the copy.
Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (Bronze) will be on view along with 22 monumental sculptures throughout the Olympic Sculpture Park, including The Eagle (1971) by Alexander Calder, Wake (2002–03) by Richard Serra, and Seattle Cloud Cover (2006) by Teresita Fernández. Seattle’s largest green space, the nine-acre sculpture park is free and open daily from 30 minutes before sunrise to 30 minutes after sunset.
Special funding for this installation provided by Jeffrey* and Susan Brotman, Jon and Mary Shirley Foundation, and Walker Family Fund.
Image: Courtesy of Ai Weiwei Studio. Photo: Gao Yuan
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Seattle Art Museum, 1300 1st Ave, Seattle, WA 98101-2003, United States,Seattle, Washington
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