The German arts media have been in a tizzy this year (summary, in English) over European architects' "collaboration" with non-democratic regimes--especially China, and especially around next month's Olympic Games.
The main question is of the political meaning of art: does building for a totalitarian regime lend legitimacy to said regime? The jury is out on the matter, at least in part because of China's non-pariah status in the business world--and architecture belongs as much to business as to art.
A bigger problem, in my eyes, is the question of ambiguous guilt. We all sense that our hands are bloodied by virtue of being in this world, yet we can't discern why, or a way out.
The resultant Puritanism of the secular left is the main reason why America by and large hasn't joined the progressive movement: there's more guilt there than you can shake a stick at, and no hope for salvation (see obsessive carbon-counting).
Europe (European cultural leaders at least) is much more sold on ambiguous guilt, which is why Architecture finds itself in this debate.
I don't have an opinion about the answer: where is the boundary between engagement with a totalitarian regime and endorsement of it? I don't know. But my sense is that the answer doesn't lie anywhere on that axis.
Photo Credit Flickr User Theo W L Jones
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