Celebrated Chinese artist, architect, and outspoken political dissident Ai Weiwei hopes to put his next major art exhibition on Alcatraz Island. Ai is currently working with National Park Service, the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy and other local agencies to get approval for the project. If approved, the show could open on the infamous former federal prison island sometime in fall 2014.
Local non-profit the For-Site Foundation is acting as the artist's liaison in San Francisco and as the Art Newspaper reports, the proposed exhibition could be approved as early as November of this year. Apparently, the approval process got a little sidetracked by the government shutdown earlier this month.
At the moment, there isn't much additional information about what Ai is planning to show in the prison-turned-art gallery, but he's teased the project by wearing one of those souvenir Alcatraz hats in a self-portrait he posted to Instagram earlier this week:
The artist himself was imprisoned after his arrest in 2011. Two years after his release he depicted his prison experiences in a set of dioramas. He also released an artsy heavy metal track and accompanying music video that dramatizes his time in prison. The track was called "Dumbass." Oh, and he his own delightfully weird take on Gangnam Style:
