For his retrospective exhibition at the Royal Academy in 2015, Ai Weiwei created 106 coloured drip paintings. These paintings on thick paper were individually made by the artist in one of ten colours: black, white, yellow, red, green, blue, purple, turquoise, lilac and grey. In each a bold, calligraphic stroke sweeps across the paper to produce a painting of great vibrancy and spontaneity in celebration of the tactile qualities of the medium. Using a fully loaded brush, Ai Weiwei has allowed the paint to run and dribble down the paper under its own weight, producing works with an affinity to his Coloured Vases, which he creates by dipping antique Chinese ceramics into the same type of brightly coloured paint and allowing it to flow down each vessel.

Actually conceived as dust jackets for the deluxe edition of the hardback exhibition catalogue, virtually none of these paintings have been used for their intended purpose. Due to their extreme beauty and the unacceptable risk of damage if actually made to function as bookcovers, the vast majority have been framed.

Each individual work has its own certificate of authenticity. Of the original 106 coloured paintings, it is understood that only two collections of all 10 colours remain, the rest having been sold individually or in smaller groups.