Ai Weiwei and the hidden lives of objects

Ai Weiwei is a master of spectacle. In 1995 he produced three black-and-white photographs in which he smashed what looked like a 2,000-year-old urn; it was not clear whether the ceramic was real or a fake. In 2010 he covered the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern with 100m handmade porcelain sunflower seeds—a reference both to Chinese Communist Party imagery, wherein Mao Zedong represented the sun, and a symbol of brighter times to come. A huge sculpture at the Royal Academy in 2015 was designed to evoke horror as well as awe. Mr Ai arranged 90 tonnes of steel reinforcing bars…