“Accommodating Reform: International Hotels and Architecture in China, 1978-1990” is on view at the Ullens Centre for Contemporary Art, Beijing, through October 23. The exhibition traces the emergence and development of the international hotel as an architectural and cultural phenomenon in China during the late 1970s and the 1980s.Models, plans, photographs, ephemera, and artworks related to seven iconic buildings in Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, and Guangzhou are on display. The exhibition is curated by architectural historian and Hong Kong University associate professor Cole Roskam. It focuses on seven projects located on China’s east coast, including the east wing of the Beijing Hotel.Materials derived from recent history, and artifacts belonging to the cultural imports of these politically and economically innovative sites take up the exhibition space. These materials recall an uncertain era of artistic and intellectual exploration.Click on the slideshow for a sneak peek of the exhibition.
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