BOOK Witness an aftereffect of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing: a curiosity, at home and abroad, about the guarded host country that is home to 20 percent of the world’s population. A new book by Dutch publishers 010, The Chinese Dream: A Society Under Construction (by Neville Mars and Adrian Hornsby; €49.50; 010publishers.com) tackles China’s growth in 784 pages and 1,800 images and infographics. The book is as dense as its subject and nearly as overstimulating but welcome in its candor.

BOOK Witness an aftereffect of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing: a curiosity, at home and abroad, about the guarded host country that is home to 20 percent of the world’s population. A new book by Dutch publishers 010, The Chinese Dream: A Society Under Construction (by Neville Mars and Adrian Hornsby; €49.50; 010publishers.com) tackles China’s growth in 784 pages and 1,800 images and infographics. The book is as dense as its subject and nearly as overstimulating but welcome in its candor.

Credit: Charlie Brown

EXHIBIT Aaron Betsky presents Chinese fashion designers, graphic artists, and architects in China Design Now (Cincinnati Art Museum; Oct. 18 through Jan. 11; cincinnatiartmuseum.org). Structure as a journey, the show was designed by Yung Ho Chang, Chinese architect and head of MIT’s Department of Architecture.

EXHIBIT Aaron Betsky presents Chinese fashion designers, graphic artists, and architects in China Design Now (Cincinnati Art Museum; Oct. 18 through Jan. 11; cincinnatiartmuseum.org). Structure as a journey, the show was designed by Yung Ho Chang, Chinese architect and head of MIT’s Department of Architecture.

Credit: JIJI, CINCINNATI ART MUSEUM

EXHIBIT Museo Aero Solar Franconia Sculpture Park, Franconia, Minn. Oct. 18 through 19 Argentinian artist Tomás Saraceno arrives at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis on Oct. 4 to lead local residents through the process of building a giant balloon from thousands of used plastic bags. The construction launches in the St. Croix River Valley two weeks later. Saraceno has done this before, adding bags from each host country (Italy, UAE, Colombia, France, Switzerland, Albania) and borrowing aerospace technology to make the thing fly. Saraceno says he builds balloons as a means of escape, an idea borne during the French Revolution and useful today in confronting population growth and changing climates. walkerart.org

EXHIBIT Museo Aero Solar Franconia Sculpture Park, Franconia, Minn. Oct. 18 through 19 Argentinian artist Tomás Saraceno arrives at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis on Oct. 4 to lead local residents through the process of building a giant balloon from thousands of used plastic bags. The construction launches in the St. Croix River Valley two weeks later. Saraceno has done this before, adding bags from each host country (Italy, UAE, Colombia, France, Switzerland, Albania) and borrowing aerospace technology to make the thing fly. Saraceno says he builds balloons as a means of escape, an idea borne during the French Revolution and useful today in confronting population growth and changing climates. walkerart.org

Credit: MUSEO AERO SOLAR

BOOK Modern Swedish Design: Three Founding Texts Introduction by Kenneth Frampton Nobody questions the widespread influence of Swedish design, but few could examine its roots until now, with the first English translations of three seminal texts—made all the more convincing when laid out as near facsimiles of their original publications. Ellen Key wrote in 1899, Gregor Paulsson in 1919, and Paulsson and five architects who formed the Stockholm Exhibition in 1930. Together they advocate a philosophy that has trickled down over the past 100 years to reach every Ikea shopper: Society benefits when good design is affordable to all. Museum of Modern Art; $35

BOOK Modern Swedish Design: Three Founding Texts Introduction by Kenneth Frampton Nobody questions the widespread influence of Swedish design, but few could examine its roots until now, with the first English translations of three seminal texts—made all the more convincing when laid out as near facsimiles of their original publications. Ellen Key wrote in 1899, Gregor Paulsson in 1919, and Paulsson and five architects who formed the Stockholm Exhibition in 1930. Together they advocate a philosophy that has trickled down over the past 100 years to reach every Ikea shopper: Society benefits when good design is affordable to all. Museum of Modern Art; $35

Credit: CHARLIE BROWN

EXHIBIT First Doubt: Optical Confusion in Modern Photography Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn. Oct. 7 through Jan. 4 One hundred confusing photos challenge the assumption that a camera conveys clearly what stands in front of its lens. Optical confusion is a little-discussed but universally fooling fi eld of photography, with examples stretching back to early experiments with the medium. What began as frustrating accidents became intentionally ambiguous in the hands of scam-artists, Surrealists, and Photoshoppers alike. artgallery.yale.edu

EXHIBIT First Doubt: Optical Confusion in Modern Photography Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn. Oct. 7 through Jan. 4 One hundred confusing photos challenge the assumption that a camera conveys clearly what stands in front of its lens. Optical confusion is a little-discussed but universally fooling fi eld of photography, with examples stretching back to early experiments with the medium. What began as frustrating accidents became intentionally ambiguous in the hands of scam-artists, Surrealists, and Photoshoppers alike. artgallery.yale.edu

Credit: YALE UNIVERSITY ART GALLERY

EXHIBIT Red Lines, Death Vows, Foreclosures, Risk Structures: Architectures of Finance from the Great Depression to the Subprime Meltdown MIT Museum, Cambridge, Mass. Through Dec. 21 Designer Damon Rich and the Center for Urban Pedagogy team up to present an installation of models, photographs, videos, and drawings documenting the relation between finance and architecture and the rise and fall of capital and buildings. Rich spent a year surveying the darkening market and interviewing players from mortgage brokers in bars to the Comptroller of the Currency in Washington, D.C. mit.edu/museum

EXHIBIT Red Lines, Death Vows, Foreclosures, Risk Structures: Architectures of Finance from the Great Depression to the Subprime Meltdown MIT Museum, Cambridge, Mass. Through Dec. 21 Designer Damon Rich and the Center for Urban Pedagogy team up to present an installation of models, photographs, videos, and drawings documenting the relation between finance and architecture and the rise and fall of capital and buildings. Rich spent a year surveying the darkening market and interviewing players from mortgage brokers in bars to the Comptroller of the Currency in Washington, D.C. mit.edu/museum

Credit: MIT

EXHIBIT Chanel Contemporary Art Container Central Park, New York Oct. 20 through Nov. 9 A glamorous spaceship lands in New York after stops in Hong Kong and Tokyo, en route to London, Moscow, and Paris. At the request of Karl Lagerfeld, Zaha Hadid designed the nautilus-shaped container, clad in white polymer panels that suggest the quilting on a Chanel bag, as a kit of parts that can be deconstructed and reassembled. “Why did I choose Zaha Hadid?” Lagerfeld asks. “She is a kind of Coco Chanel of today, not in fashion, but in architecture.” Inside, a free exhibition leads ticket holders through a multidimensional, multi-artist meditation on the handbag. Curated by Beaux Arts Magazine editor in chief Fabrice Bousteau, the show includes work by Leandro Erlich, Lee Bul, Stephen Shore, and Yang Fudong. chanel-mobileart.com

EXHIBIT Chanel Contemporary Art Container Central Park, New York Oct. 20 through Nov. 9 A glamorous spaceship lands in New York after stops in Hong Kong and Tokyo, en route to London, Moscow, and Paris. At the request of Karl Lagerfeld, Zaha Hadid designed the nautilus-shaped container, clad in white polymer panels that suggest the quilting on a Chanel bag, as a kit of parts that can be deconstructed and reassembled. “Why did I choose Zaha Hadid?” Lagerfeld asks. “She is a kind of Coco Chanel of today, not in fashion, but in architecture.” Inside, a free exhibition leads ticket holders through a multidimensional, multi-artist meditation on the handbag. Curated by Beaux Arts Magazine editor in chief Fabrice Bousteau, the show includes work by Leandro Erlich, Lee Bul, Stephen Shore, and Yang Fudong. chanel-mobileart.com

Credit: CHANEL