Ai Weiwei [file photo]

The artist told the Global Times during an earlier interview that he signed a 30-year lease with the village committee in Malu town in Jiading district in 2008 for 60,000 yuan ($8,988) a year. The external part of Ai's studio was completed in March, 2009.

The 2,000-square-meter studio cost about 7 million ($1 million) in total.

Ai had also said that local authorities proposed to compensate him.

The artist told the Global Times early November that demolition was indeed connected to his decision to release two documentary films.

One is about a man who killed six police officers in Shanghai, and the other is about a Shanghai lawyer, Feng Zhenghu, who was stranded at Tokyo's Narita airport for more than 100 days, according to Ai.