'Sunflower Seeds' by Ai Weiwei has most recently been in the news (22nd October) for visitors now being restricted from walking on the installation of 100 million porcelain seeds. I unfortunately didn't get a chance to see it before this change was made, however, I still found it quite awe-inspiring. What was most interesting was the short film on it that is being shown on a loop just next the exhibit at the front of the Turbine Hall. Each seed is individual and each one has been painted by hand. They are all made in small-scale workshops in the Chinese city of Jingdezhen and the film illustrates the change that this project made to the city and its inhabitants. China is renowned for its imports of porcelain but this surely is one of the strangest commissions China, let alone that small city, will ever receive. There is a whole series of processes through which each seed must go, which the film briefly shows, and I find it amazing the dedication everybody had to the project to keep going with it however repetitive. It is impossible to envisage what the final result would be and thus the choice to hand paint each seed must have been a combination of excitement and anticipation and yet monotonous.
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