FLASH MEMORY

When I arrived in Beijing in 2006, the CCTV headquarters was one of those many only-in-China phenomena that sits on the edge of reality and science-fiction. Even now, as the building nears completion (and after a spectacular fire that gutted its cultural annex), it still is. In the shape of a door, in the shape of a donut, in the shape of a squatting figure or a pair of genitalia, in the shape of nothing, built around a void, the building resists understanding as much as it commands our stares.

“CCTV,” Icon
“Strange Loop,” The National
“Beijing’s Trial by Fire,” Far Eastern Economic Review (and Slideshow)
“Pulling Up Architecture By the Boot,” tbjHome
“Brave New Beijing,” The Guardian