Ai Weiwei: Sewing a Button

Fifteen years ago, Ai Weiwei was secretly detained without any formal charges by Public Security in China. For 81 days, he lived in a single cell, eating his meals, washing and exercising between interrogations. Now Weiwei presents Sewing a Button – a 24-hour live performance work re-enacting this brutal, life-changing experience.

Sewing a Button condenses Weiwei’s detention into 24 hours, inviting audiences through day and night to bear witness to his experience. In a recreation of his cell, Weiwei sleeps, eats, writes and washes – sometimes, he is interrogated.

As a companion piece to landmark exhibition Button Up!, Sewing a Button reflects the fearless interplay between the personal and political in Weiwei’s work. Button Up! confronts 200 years of power, trade, war, culture and Empire that have shaped relations between Britain and China; Sewing a Button distils these forces into a frighteningly intimate human story.

The event will feature a live broadcast of the performance taking place at Aviva Studios, home of Factory International, in Manchester.

Unsettling and provocative, Sewing a Button exposes the fragility of personal freedoms in today’s uncertain world.

Practical information: Basement -2. From 6pm to 6pm on 3rd July – 4th July.