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How were the 100 million porcelain sunflower seeds made for Ai Weiwei’s Tate Modern installation?

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Chinese activist and artist Ai Weiwei in 2019, facing the camera and wearing a black zip-up jacket. — Ai Weiwei Ai Weiwei, 2019.

For his 2010 installation at the Tate Modern, Ai Weiwei commissioned the production of 100 million individual sunflower seeds made of porcelain.

These seeds were not mass-produced by machines; rather, they were meticulously hand-painted by approximately 1,600 Chinese artisans. By utilizing traditional craftsmanship to create these fragile sculptures, the artist intended for the work to serve as a metaphor for the downtrodden Chinese populace.1