Despite inflated budgets and egos, the art provocateur makes his film acting k back next week, when we will announce the official premiere date of the short film "The Sandstorm," starring Ai Weiwei.
尽管出现了预算超支和性格冲突问题，艾未未这位艺术破坏分子还是完成了他在电影中的首次亮相。下星期（本文最初发表于2014年8月23日——编注）我们会宣布由艾未未参演的这部电影短片《沙尘暴》(The Sandstorm)的首映日期。In 2013, after more than six years as the head of video for TED Talks, Jason Wishnow went to Beijing for a break. During a visit with Ai Weiwei he asked the artist to appear in "The Sand Storm," a short film he had been developing. Drawn to Wishnow's idea of water as a metaphor for the flow of information, Ai agreed to play a water deliveryman in an arid world. They shot rogue near Ai's studio in the gritty district of Caochangdi, where a spike in Beijing's pollution index required the crew to wear face masks and gave the film its sickly brownish yellow tint.
2013年，六年来为TED演讲担任影像总监的杰森·维什诺(Jason Wishnow)来北京度假。访问艾未未时，他邀请这位艺术家在自己筹拍的短片《沙尘暴》中亮相。维什诺在片中把“水”作为隐喻，象征着信息的流动，艾未未受这个创意吸引，同意在片中扮演一个干旱世界里的送水工。他们在艾未未草场地工作室附近一处多砂的地方拍摄，当时北京污染指数飙升，剧组成员都要戴着面具，也令整部影片都呈现出病态的褐黄色调。
By the time Wishnow locked his edit, he was out of cash, so he launched an ill-fated Kickstarter campaign. Ai sent Wishnow a cease-and-desist letter, furious that his image and involvement had been exaggerated and "co-opted for promotional purposes." Kickstarter suspended the campaign, and Wishnow returned to Beijing hoping to make amends. In a widely reprinted — and ultimately successful — open apology, he wrote, "Creative endeavors with artistic titans should not be treated lightly." The rebooted campaign became the third-best-funded short film in the site's history, bringing in over $100,000.
维什诺剪完片子，预算也花光了，于是他在Kickstarter网站上发起了一次运命多舛的众筹。艾未未看到自己在片中的形象，感到非常愤怒，觉得自己的参与被夸大了，被“利用为宣传目的”，于是给维什诺发去信函，要求他停止并终止电影的制作。Kickstarter网站中止了众筹活动，维什诺回到北京，希望和艾未未修好。在一份被广泛转载的公开道歉书中，他写道：“与艺术巨人合作的创作尝试不应被轻率处理。”艾未未接受了道歉，众筹重新启动，在该网站电影短片类众筹中，这个项目的筹款金额位居第三，最终筹到了10多万美元。
Ai hasn't made any further comment. He doesn't say much more than that in the film, in which he mainly drives a tuk-tuk while wearing a costume that's part Mad Max, part Chinese laborer's uniform. But his presence is deeply felt in "The Sand Storm" just as it is in the international art world. Asked on set how he felt about his role, Ai answered with typical mischievousness: "In life, we all deliver something."
艾未未并没就此事做出进一步评论。在片中他没有什么台词，主要是身穿一件半像“疯狂马克斯”(Mad Max)，半像中国工作服的衣服，蹬着一辆三轮车。但是他的出现在片中给人带来深刻的感受，正如在互联网艺术界一样。被问到他对这个角色怎么看时，艾未未用典型的恶作剧口吻回答：“在生活中，我们每个人都得投送点什么。”