Two pieces from my favorite periodicals that contain the words “New York”:

1. The New York Times Magazine on architecture in the (post-)postmodern city. Features Dubai and some other new cities, with a lengthy digression on Shenzhen, China’s shining beacon of capitalism (and cultural wasteland, here euphemistically termed “product of unregulated development”). Take home messages: architects have staunch political principles, unless you pay them a lot; dictatorships make some pretty sweet buildings.

2. The New Yorker on music in China. Very thorough overview of the “classical music phenomenon” (i.e. non-phenomenon) in China, if a little bit quick to jump on the well-read-new-yorker-rambling-about-China’s-problems bandwagon. More interesting–and less presumptuous–are the tidbits about the Chinese avant-garde and an expat-led burgeoning of underground indie rock in Beijing. Yes, indie rock in Beijing.

Silly China, it still thinks building up its culture is like playing a game of Civilization IV. Doesn’t it know that all it has to do is give artists freedom and democracy, and their work will suddenly become legitimate, and win the approval of music critics in the West?