The Martin-Gropius-Bau opened a one-man show of Ai Weiwei’s work titled “Evidence.” It spans three decades of the dissident Chinese artist’s career.

The “Evidence” from which the Ai Weiwei exhibition at the Martin-Gropius-Bauderives its name could be the displayed collection of hard drives, laptops and notebooks the Chinese authorities confiscated after arresting the artist in 2011 as he tried to board a plane. Or it could be the life-size replica of the cell where he was held under constant surveillance for 81 days following his detention. Or even the 6,000 wooden stools that fill the sunken atrium of the space, in a silent testimony to a lost way of life in the Chinese countryside.

Mr. Ai’s solo exhibition, which opened here on Thursday and runs through July 7, is the largest show of his works to date. It reflects both the current social upheaval in China, as well as the artist’s own experiences with repression. Organizers said they encouraged Mr. Ai, who has long angered the Chinese authorities through his outspoken opinions about censorship and art, to highlight the political element of his works in the show.

An installation of 6,000 stools at the new Ai Weiwei exhibition in Berlin. CreditSean Gallup/Getty Images

“He is always accused of being a political activist,” said Gereon Sievernich, the director of the Martin-Gropius-Bau, in a recent interview. Mr. Sievernich made several trips to China to meet with Mr. Ai, who has not been allowed to travel since his release. “We took that charge and stood it on its head and fully embraced the political,” he said.

“That this is taking place in the Martin-Gropius-Bau, which is funded by the German state, is a German response to this political art and to the power of culture,” said Monika Grütters, Germany’s minister for culture, before the opening. She also stressed the importance of holding the exhibition in one of the country’s most prominent, state-funded exhibition spaces for art.

“Evidence” was two years in the making, said Mr. Sievernich, who curated the show with Mr. Ai. Members of the artist’s team who were allowed to travel came to Berlin to help install the works, most of which were shipped by sea from China, while a few arrived from North America.

The installations are displayed in 18 rooms and several of the main conceptual works were made for the exhibition, while the others have not previously been shown in Germany, where Mr. Ai enjoys a large following. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany pressured the Chinese government for Mr. Ai’s release in 2011 and there were hopes that she would be successful in securing him a new passport to attend the opening of the exhibition in Berlin. That did not happen.

Ai Weiwei. CreditGao Yuan

Instead, Mr. Ai sent a video message from his studio in Beijing, where the installations were conceived and prepared with his team of 20 assistants. The message was shown at the opening of the exhibition.

“This show reflects the work in past years. Most of them are new works,” Mr. Ai said, speaking in English. “Some are related to my current condition, related to my concerns. Some are more aesthetic presentation of the kind of concerns that I always have with art and art history. Some are more involved with my activities on the Internet and documentary.”

An element of that condition — the constant surveillance of Mr. Ai by the Chinese authorities — greets visitors as they enter the exhibition in the form of two cameras, marble replicas of those trained on the entrance to the artist’s Beijing studio.

Above them, a web of 150 bicycles by the Shanghai-based Forever bike makers hangs suspended from a rotunda. Called “Very Yao,” the work is a nod to Marcel Duchamp, the conceptual artist who Mr. Ai often references. It also commemorates the controversial case of a young Beijing resident,Yang Jia, who was arrested on charges of stealing a bike in 2007 and gained public sympathy for speaking out against the police harassment he said he suffered. Mr. Yang later killed six Shanghai police officers and was executed in 2008, but to many Chinese he remained a symbol of the individual standing up against government injustice.

For “Stools,” a collection of 6,000 traditional Chinese stools lined up in tight rows, Mr. Ai designed the work to fit the sunken level of the 19th-century exhibition hall’s central atrium. To create it, Mr. Ai carefully studied the building’s architecture and drawing plans, creating tight rows that look pixelated from a distance.

Mr. Ai’s “Very Yao” installation at the Martin-Gropius-Bau.CreditJohannes Eisele/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Alexander Ochs, a Berlin-based gallery owner who has known Mr. Ai since the late 1990s and helped to build his following in Germany, said the show reflected the full range of the artist’s abilities.

“Ai Weiwei has given us a very political, but also very aesthetically and a deeply spiritual exhibition,” said Mr. Ochs, who helped found the Friends of Ai Weiwei group, which has raised awareness of Mr. Ai’s situation with the German public and politicians.

The artist had hoped until the last minute that he would be able to attend the opening, telling the German public radio broadcaster ARD last week that he kept a suitcase packed and ready. Mr. Ochs and his friends have been lobbying Ms. Merkel’s government to take up the case with Chinese officials, including President Xi Jinping who visited Berlin last week.

Supporters in the United States, where exhibitions are planned at theBrooklyn Museum and on Alcatraz in California, have also taken up the call for Mr. Ai to be allowed to travel. Last month the graphic artist Shepard Fairey released a poster of Mr. Ai, his head shaved and bearing a gash from a run-in with police, in a sign of solidarity.

Despite, or perhaps because, of Germany’s support, Mr. Ai did not shy from a wink at the powerful industrial country in an installation included in the show. It involves eight ceramic vases from the Han Dynasty painted in the metallic greens, shimmering silver and iridescent blue of the luxury automobiles that earn German carmakers millions each year in sales to the Chinese market.

“Everywhere he is sending us little messages in a bottle,” Mr. Sievernich said.

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