A giant carpet of more than 100m handmade porcelain sunflower seeds by China’s most famous living artist has been unveiled as the latest installation at Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall.

The work by Ai Weiwei, the 11th in the series of Unilever commissions for the gallery, covers 1,000 sq metres of the hall, weighs 150 tonnes and was created by 1,600 artisans from the Chinese city of Jingdezhen. The artist described the work, “Sunflower Seeds”, as motivated by his concern to incorporate ancient crafts and traditions into contemporary art.

He picked the motif of sunflower seeds because of its ubiquitous function as one of the country’s most common street snacks – but also because of its use as a propaganda image during the Cultural Revolution, representing the mass of people turning towards the “sunshine” of their leader, Mao Zedong.