From Book to Buildings: Book Talk & Signing with Architect Neville Mars

Morono Kiang Gallery presents a special program with Beijing-based Dutch architect Neville Mars to discuss his new book THE CHINESE DREAM – a society under construction.

Morono Kiang Gallery is pleased to invite you to a special program with Beijing-based Dutch architect Neville Mars to discuss his new book THE CHINESE DREAM – a society under construction (produced and designed by Mars, Adrian Hornsby & the DYNAMIC CITY FOUNDATION, published 2008 by 010 Publishers, Rotterdam). Autographed copies of the book will be available for purchase.

THE CHINESE DREAM is a visual tour de force, both encyclopedic in scope and holistic in approach. Cutting across all levels of scale — from individual to national — and backed by a truly multi-disciplinary team (encompassing architecture & urban planning, politics, economics, arts & culture, environmental concerns, and sociology) the book synthesizes a vast body of research to tackle the big questions of today, and to unpack the paradoxes at the heart of China's struggle for change.

Taking as its starting point the goal announced in China in 2001 to build 400 new cities of 1 million inhabitants each by 2020, or 20 new cities a year for 20 years, the book explores the hopes and hazards of dreaming on such a scale. The question being asked is in fact no less than how to build a new utopia. But is China mortgaging its present for a promised future, and doing so at the same time that current speeds of construction eclipse any real forward planning?

Assembled over a four-year continuous presence in China, the book lays aside over-exposed "starchitect" projects, and looks instead at the enormous building wave currently reshaping the landscape and fabric of China itself. Bold texts, self-critical design proposals, exploratory photo essays, a unique glossary, and an innovative survey of China's young middle class, reveal China in all its astonishing diversity: from the glitziest mega malls to the gloomiest slums, and from the rural fringe to the mushrooming village. Featuring thousands of photographs, drawings and computer graphics, this is space as you have never seen it before: brash, outlandish, and very Chinese.

Morono Kiang Gallery occupies over 3,000 square feet of exhibition space, located on the ground floor of the historic Bradbury Building in downtown Los Angeles.  The gallery promotes cutting-edge contemporary Chinese art, exhibiting work by both recognized and emerging artists. Currently on view, "Varvara Shavrova: Between the Borders," the United States debut of new paintings by this Russian-born Beijing-based artist.