MCLC: Zaha Hadid ripoff in Chongqing

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: Zaha Hadid ripoff in Chongqing
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Source: ArtDaily (1/9/13):
http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=59957#.UO2Dw4njl1p

China developer from the southwestern city of Chongqing 'copies' star
architect Zaha Hadid's design

Already famed for fake designer bags and pirated DVDs, imitation in China
may have reached new heights with a set of towers that strongly resemble
ones designed by renowned architect Zaha Hadid.

A developer in the southwestern city of Chongqing is putting up buildings
that share the distinctive round contours and white stripes of a 39-floor
shopping and office complex conceived by the British-Iraqi designer and
being built in Beijing.

The magazine China Intellectual Property noted that the "design sketch
indeed shows certain similarities", and listed several buildings by the
developer that resembled others elsewhere in China.

Satoshi Ohashi, project director at Zaha Hadid Architects for the Beijing
complex, told Der Spiegel Online: "It is possible that the Chongqing
pirates got hold of some digital files or renderings of the project."

It could rank among the more flagrant ripoffs in a country already
notorious for imitating foreign products without permission -- but the
developer of the Chongqing project, Meiquan 22nd Century, has denied any
copying. 

Such accusations "do not conform with the truth" and "have had a negative
impact" on the company, general manager Yao Yumao said at an earlier press
conference, according to a transcript published online.

Hadid was the first woman to win architecture's prestigious Pritzker
prize. 

Her avant-garde designs have been in high demand in China, where she has a
granite and glass opera house in the southern city of Guangzhou and an
arts centre under construction in Chengdu, among other projects.

China's ability to reproduce foreign products is best known for imitation
luxury purses and copies of Hollywood films. But knockoffs have ranged
from a three-dollar version of Kate Middleton's engagement ring to fake
Apple stores and an entire Austrian village.

In 2012 a developer unveiled a recreation of the centuries-old alpine
hamlet of Hallstatt, a UNESCO World Heritage site, in what the state-run
news agency Xinhua called "a bold example of China's knock-off culture".

cdh/slb/mtp 

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