Absurdity, Allegory and China

A few months back (October 14, 2011) Rem Koolhaas, brand architect behind OMA, the architectural firm that has been involved with the design and building of the iconic CCTV Headquarters Building on the East Third Ring Road, was the subject of an article in Bloomberg’s BusinessWeek: Pritzker Star Koolhaas Frets Over EU, Tops Giant Beijing [...]

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It has been awhile since I’ve blogged, though not because I’ve not wanted to. I just haven’t wanted too enough. Inertia is … addictive. The force that changed my direction was, as it has so often been, the CCTV HQ Building. On the evening of December 20, 2010, the folks at the CCTV Headquarters Building [...]

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I had written a long blog entry to go with these photos, explaining the National Holiday air quality issue, but I lost it. It happens. Though I’m not one who usually lets things go, there’s not much I can do about this one, so I’ve come to terms with the fact that it has been [...]

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An old joke: first day in prison a young inmate sits silently in the cafeteria spooning his gruel. The rule for all meals is a firm ‘no talking.’ As everyone quietly slops it in a guy jumps up and yells, “Fifty-six!” and quickly retakes his seat. Everyone breaks into hysterical laughter (gruel spraying through the [...]

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I thought I would give a video slideshow a try, so here is my first attempt, a few of my photos from the OMA / Koolhaas CCTV Headquarters project. The music is from Red Unit, Shanghai, a techno CulRev mix entitled The Ideal of Maoism. The music is Open Source. The voice-over is Zhou Enlai [...]

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Often when I take photos I don’t get around to looking at them for a while. I find I need a bit of distance between shooting and looking at what’s been shot in order to get a clearer perspective on what is good and what is not. So, last night I found this one from [...]

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What looks clear from the post-fire photos is that the basic structural shape of the TVCC building does not appear to have been altered at all. The lines look to be consistent with the pre-fire lines, though what it looks like inside is still, for me, a guess. I don’t believe that there is any [...]

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In early June I went to the CCTV Bldg. to have a look and what I found cocked my brow a few degrees: on the roof of the northwest tower, Tower 1, there was a helipad, a circular affair that oddly took the edge off the well-defined linear profile. A circle of all things! As [...]

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