Shanghaiist: China's political constructions

Fuzi

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 23:54:23 +0800

rldh: I think you overestimate the sensibilities of the general populace. It is my feeling that the overwhelming majority of people only see a "neato" building. Now whether that subconsciously affects their view of the political structure of the city/country hosting the building remains to be seen. I would wager it has little if any effect. Personally, I appreciate some of the amazing architecture I've seen in some less-than-desirable countries but said architecture does not preclude me from thinking the government of the country is hideous. I believe most people would feel the same. As I stated previously, "I think some people put way too much importance on both themeselves and a building."

rldh

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 00:41:48 +0800

"..(T)here will not be any "Oh, such a magnificent building, the government's political structure must be beneficent and sanctioned by everyone else in the world!"... they'll just say, "Hey, what a neat building!"" Fuzi, are you kidding me, or are you just off the boat. Because that is exactly what many people in China think about all these buildings; you have it totally the wrong way round. Clearly you do not speak or read Chinese, because you would be able to read all the banners hanging around with slogans stating exactly the idea that you are rubbishing. Or you'd have overheard the endless 'our Shanghai has so many wonderful buildings'/'Our China is developing so fast'/'Shanghai is most modern city in whole world', with the clear underlying point being that the government is doing a great job. Or your folks haven't yet come to visit and babbled on breathlessly about all the amazing buildings, how China's much more developed than they thought, and gee it really is going to be China's century isn't it. And hey it's not like dictatorships throughout history have not deliberately used architecture to impress their subjects of the power: e.g. the Nazis, the Soviets, the Mao-era Chinese, plus, er, pretty much every ancient empire ever. What kind of place do you think you are living in? Does anything happen here for non-propaganda reasons and do the populace just not lap it up? Like...the Tibet railway/Olympics/useless Shanghai Maglev/Three Gorges Dam etc etc etc plus a thousand other White Elephant examples. All done with the aim of stating to a populace floundering about in these uncertain, post-ideological times, 'we are on it, out of control economic growth tamped down with rampant nationalism is the way forward, everything is onward and upward from here peeps, trust CCP/Daddy, it's all good, oh and, by the way, tremble and obey!' Fuzi, COME ON!

jago

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 19:27:48 +0800

But when that building is the state-of-the-art television building in a totalitarian state where CCTV is the muscled arm of the Propaganda Ministry, broadcasting numbingly inane programs to The People, it sort of makes the Bird's Nest pale as a comparative agitprop venue.

taihanasie

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 11:19:29 +0800

I agree with Fuzi on this one. There are far worse ways of tacitly accepting a totalitarian regime's policies than the construction of buildings. However, there are a few exceptions, the most notable of which is the "Bird's Nest" in Beijing. A building can indeed feed propaganda. Most will, however, never earn this dubious honour though, and some will earn the opposite. :-P I have read many more critical reviews of the ugly pair of legs that is the new CCTV headquarters than positive ones. You could just as easily say that such a ghastly structure represents the pitfalls of placing more value on modernity than on aesthetics as say that it represents the ascendance of a new China.

Fuzi

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:55:05 +0800

I think some people put way too much importance on both themeselves and a building. After all, it is still just a building, no matter how unique and grand it may be. The average person, meaning 99.99999% of the people who will see the building, there will not be any "Oh, such a magnificent building, the government's political structure must be beneficent and sanctioned by everyone else in the world!"... they'll just say, "Hey, what a neat building!".

rldh

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:57:10 +0800

'...do architects implicitly sanction the client’s actions or collaborate in symbolic mythmaking?' Er, yes. But then the 'name' architect is pretty much your typical monomaniacal tyrant himself. For guys like Koolhaas working in China is positively liberating after the developed world, with all its tiresome health and safety standards, open scrutiny of how public money is being spent and all round lack of crazed tyrants wanting to build monuments to themselves.