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Editor’s Note: This is an excerpt from  On Censorship by Ai Weiwei. It releases in March from Thames & Hudson .   In 2025, the rapid development of artificial intelligence pushed a group of young Chinese entrepreneurs to the forefront with DeepSeek, which propelled its search technology into new territories. This triggered panic within the highly competitive AI landscape, sparking strategic shifts in western-dominated technology ecosystems and causing significant market disruptions. Once again, it forces us to reflect deeply on the rise of AI in the information age. At its core, AI represents a mythical level of information control, which is also the very foundation of any censorship system.   An interesting incident occurred when people tested this new AI tool by asking about me. The AI’s response was blunt: “Let’s talk about something else.” This is precisely the problem. For decades, the Chinese regime has employed similar strategies—refusing to acknowledge th...

On Canada’s Pacific coast, where shipyards hum and warships take shape against a backdrop of mountains and sea, the federal government’s new defence agenda is moving from policy to practice. From February 18 to 20, 2026, the Honourable David J. McGuinty, Minister of National Defence, concluded a visit to British Columbia aimed at advancing Canada’s newly released Defence Industrial Strategy (DIS) and reinforcing the province’s central role in the country’s maritime and industrial future. At the heart of the visit was a clear message: Canada’s defence renewal is not abstract. It is being built—in steel, systems, and skills—by Canadian workers. Shipbuilding at Scale: Seaspan and the National Mission On February 18, Minister McGuinty toured Seaspan Vancouver Shipyards, observing progress on major projects under Canada’s National Shipbuilding Strategy. The visit marked his first to the shipyard. Inside the vast facilities, work continues on the Royal Canadian Navy’s Joint Support Shi...

Above: General scene at Massey on Saturday in the first week of the Academy Series between Wellington, Manawatu and Hawke’s Bay. The first weekend of 15s rugby is in the can, many more to come. Nice for many to be back at the stadium, an official crowd of just shy of  14,000,  but it will...

Jasmine Little, a Los Angeles–based painter who made lush still lifes and etched ceramic vessels dense with historical references, has died at 41. La Loma, her Los Angeles gallery, announced her death on Friday. No cause of death was provided. In a statement, gallery owner Kirk Nelson, who worked with Little since 2019, described her as “a force of nature” and her work as “a reflection of her essence–at times tender, at times emotional, often naughty, always curious, and filled with wonder, beauty, pain–the whole astonishing rainbow of feeling, being.” “Even though I worked alongside her for years, I don’t know how this young artist from Joshua Tree sgraffito ’d mythologies onto stone as if she was beamed in from Pompeii A.D,” Nelson said. “She worked in divine, painful frenzies for days and weeks on end. Monuments emerged. Five-hundred-pound sculpture inlaid with obsessively, beautifully detailed linework and whole narratives. I was awed by her art and prodigy, but what I will miss ...

On Thursday, President Donald Trump came one step closer to building his $400 million White House ballroom, when an arts commission packed with allies approved designs for the project. Bypassing the usual review process—which at this stage of planning would normally have entailed only a preliminary vote—the Commission of Fine Arts gave its final approval of the proposal. The seven-person commission voted six-to-zero in favor of the plans, meaning they will not be subject to further review; the ballroom’s original architect James McCrery recused himself. The vote came despite mass opposition to the project, with the panel’s secretary Thomas Luebke saying during the meeting that he had received thousands of messages from concerned members of the public across the country. Luebke noted that “The general comments were that they were concerned about the illegal demolition without permits or oversight, inappropriate scale that will dwarf the White House, the violation of historic preserva...

Isaiah Zagar, an artist who created one of Philadelphia’s great public art attractions, died on February 19 due to complications from heart failure and Parkinson’s Disease, which he had been diagnosed with in 2023. His death was confirmed by Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens (PMG), the nonprofit organization that tends to the eponymous artwork. His creations “defined the spirit of Philadelphia,” writes the Philadelphia Inquirer . Zagar’s work is included in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Fabric Workshop and Museum, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, and the Brandywine Workshop and Archives. He received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Pew Charitable Trusts. Born in Philadelphia, Zagar was raised in Brooklyn and earned a BFA in painting from New York’s Pratt Institute. At age 19, he discovered a sprawling art environment created in Woodstock, New York, by untrained artist Clarence Schmidt, which in...