It's been three days since Vito Acconci and Ai Weiwei first met and the two architectural designers are busy swapping notes on what they have in common. Both are forward-looking in their approach and believe rules are meant to be broken. They also advocate knowledge should be free for all and art is not a subject but a way of life.
But perhaps the least apparent similarity the two men have is that their fathers continue to inspire the way they think and work.
Ai Qing, one of the most revered modern Chinese poets, fell foul of the anti-rightist campaign in the late 1950s and was exiled to farms, first in Manchuria and then Xinjiang, by the communist authorities. For decades his works were banned or burned.
'He did his public service, which was to clean public toilets,' his son, Ai, 53, says. 'He did it so well that ... it really touches me, because when everybody, the whole society, thought of it as a punishment, [my father] took it [as a duty].
'He was a person who could find joy through his work and that leaves a very strong impression on me.'
Similarly, Acconci was impressed and influenced by his father, who left Italy for the US at the age of 11.