The Collection
The American Wing Ancient Near Eastern Art Arms and Armor The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing Asian Art The Cloisters The Costume Institute Drawings and Prints Egyptian Art European Paintings European Sculpture and Decorative Arts Greek and Roman Art Islamic Art Robert Lehman Collection The Libraries Medieval Art Musical Instruments Photographs Antonio Ratti Textile Center Modern and Contemporary Art

Returned to lender The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.

Ruyi

Ai Weiwei Chinese

2006

Not on view

Ai’s reinterpretation of a ruyi (wish fulfillment) scepter, an emblem of longevity and good fortune, recontextualizes its traditional iconography to insinuate new layers of meaning. The ruyi’s form is derived from a mushroom-shaped fungus that for more than two millennia was thought to confer immortality. Ai’s scepter riffs on this belief by making its health-granting properties anatomically specific. Composed of ceramic human organs, Ai’s scepter calls to mind not long life but humankind’s physical vulnerability.

Ruyi, Ai Weiwei (Chinese, born Beijing, 1957), Glazed ceramic, China — This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.

Title: Ruyi

Artist: Ai Weiwei (Chinese, born Beijing, 1957)

Date: 2006

Culture: China

Medium: Glazed ceramic

Dimensions: 6 × 30 1/4 × 9 in. (15.2 × 77 × 22.9 cm)

Classification: Sculpture

Credit Line: Lent by M+ Sigg Collection, Hong Kong

Rights and Reproduction: © Ai Weiwei

The Met

Asian Art at The Met

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world.