Artikel over Rotterdam in the International Herald Tribune

Rotterdam - The skyline here is not dominated by church steeples or historic monuments but by the mast of the Erasmus Bridge - named for this city's most famous resident - which features a 450-foot spire that resembles an upside-down tuning fork.
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Modern office skyscrapers greet visitors at Central Station, about an hour's train ride from Amsterdam. Largely bombed out by the Germans in World War II, Rotterdam, the second-largest city in the Netherlands after Amsterdam, has completed over the last 20 years several successful renewal projects that have left it with a thriving local economy and the largest commercial port in the world.
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Not surprisingly then, perhaps, Rotterdam has become a home to architecture firms and design museums, some of which are considered the most progressive in the world. The city is increasingly to architecture what Paris is to fashion, or Los Angeles to entertainment.
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"In the early '80s, the city decided that one of the things it needed to sell was architecture," said Aaron Betsky, the director of the Netherlands Architecture Institute. As a result, the city campaigned for financing for its institutions, which led to the formation of the NAI.
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"It was a very deliberate strategy," Betsky said. "I sit here in my office, watching people with their cameras pointed up at the building, so I know they are looking at the architecture."
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Right in the center of the city are the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, the architecture institute and the Kunsthal, an art museum, which make up a rich core of art and design institutions.
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On view through May 22 at the NAI, Museumpark 25, www.nai.nl, is "No. 250," a show on the Swiss firm Herzog & de Meuron, which designed the Tate Modern in London. On a recent visit, an expansive gallery on the ground floor displayed samples and models of the firm's projects, like the Prada store in Tokyo and a huge section of the Olympic stadium in Beijing.
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Down the street, the NAI also operates Sonneveld House, a gleaming white villa from the 1930s that was ultramodern in its day and is still stunning. Much of the interior has been restored, and much of the original furniture refurbished.
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From the entrance of the institute, a dirt path leads across a footbridge directly to the entrance of the Kunsthal, also in Museumpark at Westzeedijk 341, (31-10) 440-0300, www.kunsthal.nl. It was one of the first buildings realized by Rem Koolhaas, whose firm, the Office for Metropolitan Architecture, is based in the city.
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The entrance to the museum is a steep, upwardly sloping concrete path. Inside, visitors will find that many of the corridors and pathways of the museum are much the same way; a downward slope only gives way to another upward slope. Stimulating to navigate, the Kunsthal is one of Koolhaas's early major works.
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In a city that is already rather diverse (an estimated one-sixth of its population is Muslim), Rotterdam's design culture and the international reputations of such firms as MVRDV, OMA and West 8 are a huge draw for foreigners. At the Berlage Institute, an avant-garde graduate-level design school, 57 of the 60 registered students are from outside of the country. Its gallery, at Botersloot 25, www.berlage-institute.nl, shows the often radical work of the faculty members and students.
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From May 26 to June 26, the city will be host to the second International Architecture Biennale, www.biennalerotterdam.nl, at the NAI and at the nightclub Las Palmas, Wilhelminakade 66-68. Its curator is Adriaan Geuze, of the landscape and urban design firm West 8.
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The theme of the show, "The Flood," is inspired by centuries of Dutch experience of holding the water back in a country that is several meters below sea level, and the focus will be on international water issues.
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"The idea of flooding is an important agenda for Holland," said Geuze, 45. "I would even say it's the backbone of Dutch society."
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