"It looks like a quasi-foreign devil in the historic palace area," sneered a 52-year-old blogger who goes by the name Lao Youer. "If you weren't told it was the national theater, you would probably think it was an oil tank or a huge warehouse."
Twenty-first century Beijing has become a showcase for some of the world's most audacious buildings. Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas' $600-million headquarters for Chinese Central Television struts across the Beijing skyline on two legs like a giant robot, so big that it resembles a modern-day Colossus of Rhodes. ("Like a pair of trousers. Imagine how awful it would be to work in the crotch," a 25-year-old insurance auditor wrote on a popular blog.)
The 100,000-seat Olympic stadium designed by the Swiss firm Herzog & de Meuron has been dubbed the "bird's nest" for its elaborate webbing of steel beams.
Striking to be sure, but critics complain that these new buildings are like the preposterous outfits fashion models flaunt on the runways: interesting to look at, but you wouldn't be caught wearing one in real life.
"These European architects are doing things in China they wouldn't dare do at home. They're using China as their testing grounds," said Peng Peigen, an architecture professor at Qinghua University in Beijing.
One of the most outspoken critics of the new edifices, Peng was the author of a 2004 letter that academics sent to Premier Wen Jiabao protesting the building awards to foreign architects.
Peng's objections have less to do with aesthetics than with cost and safety. The new Olympic stadium, Peng insists, uses as much steel as four stadiums. The design of the national arts center in the center of a pool means the entrances and exits are underground, making it difficult to evacuate the building in an emergency.
"You would have to run 250 meters [820 feet] from your seat to get out in a fire," Peng said. "That would never be allowed under the building codes anywhere in the United States or Canada."
A coincidence that gave credence to the critics was the collapse in May 2004 of a terminal designed by the same architect at Charles de Gaulle International Airport in Paris. Four people were killed.
The arts center is not really a single building but a cluster of three theaters -- an opera house, concert hall and traditional Chinese theater -- under the vast dome. Entry is via a long staircase under the reflecting pool.
