YEAR IN REVIEW 1999: ARCHITECTURE

Architecture As the millennium neared its end, the buildings that were generating the most architectural excitement continued to be art museums and transportation centres, especially airports. The biggest, most ambitious airport of them all, Chek Lap Kok, opened during the year in Hong Kong. Indeed, at 51 ha (1 ha = 2.47 ac), it was said to be the world's largest enclosed public space, with another 3 ha still under construction. British architect Sir Norman Foster, the principal designer, created a roof of lightweight steel vaults that allowed daylight to penetrate into the vast terminal. "It is a quest for calm spaces bathed in filtered light," the architect said. Of the many remarkable new museums, perhaps the most notable was the small, remote Miho Museum near Kyoto, Japan, by American architect I.M. Pei that opened in late 1997. It housed a collection of Asian art owned by the Koyama family, leaders of a 350,000-person spiritual association, Shinji Shumeikai, a group for whom art and nature were the key to well-being. The museum was a modern glass-and-steel structure but with triangular roofs that recalled the shapes of traditional Japanese temples. It occupied a forested mountainous site that was often shrouded in mist. (See Buildings, below.) The Miho was also noteworthy as an example of the increasing use of television to popularize architecture. A documentary by producer Peter Rosen, "The Museum on the Mountain," premiered on American television in October. Another example of the trend was a widely praised two-part biography of the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, by noted filmmakers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, that appeared in November, and still another was "Concert of Wills: Making the Getty Center," about the design and construction of the vast art complex in Los Angeles designed by Richard Meier. BRIDGES (For Notable Civil Engineering Projects, see Table.) Even though much of Asia suffered a financial crisis in 1998, the world's longest bridge was completed there, and other major projects were underway. Foremost was the opening in April in Japan of the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge, a suspension bridge with a central main span of 1,991 m (1 m = 3.28 ft). At year's end it was by the far the world's longest span, easily displacing the U.K.'s Humber Bridge. The 3,911-m-long Akashi crosses a strait of the Inland Sea and links the Japanese islands of Honshu and Shikoku via Awaji Island. The bridge took 10 years to build and was affected by the 1995 Kobe earthquake, which moved the tops of the 283-m steel towers farther apart by 0.8 m. Engineers then recalculated the design. A second noteworthy project in Japan was the Tatara cable-stayed bridge, which made up part of another bridge chain from Honshu to Shikoku. Crossing nine islands, the $800 million structure was to have a central span of 890 m when it opens in 1999 and a total length of 1,480 m. Cable-stay rather than suspension was chosen for this bridge because large suspension anchorages would have involved unsightly excavations in the middle of a national park. In China construction was well advanced on the Jiangyin highway suspension bridge, one of the world's four largest. The superstructure team from Norwegian contractor Kvrner, which built the 1,377-m Tsing Ma Bridge in Hong Kong, moved north to construct this 1,385-m central span suspension bridge across the Chang Jiang (Yangtze River) near Shanghai. It was scheduled to be completed in mid-1999 as a symbol of the 50th anniversary of the Chinese Revolution. Another landmark opening in Asia during the year was the Bangabandhu Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge in Bangladesh, one of the world's poorest nations and one regularly buffeted by typhoons and floods. The multispan concrete structure was the first major link between the two parts of the country separated by the Jamuna River, which can be up to 40 km wide in its floodplain and which frequently changes course (1 km = 0.62 mi). When construction began, the bridge abutment could be fixed at only one end; the location of the other end could not be determined until the end of the next flood season. The bridge also needed extremely deep foundations, each of the concrete piers at 100 m spacings requiring 13-m-diameter tubes driven 105 m deep for stability. In Europe another record holder, the Great Belt (Store Blt) East suspension bridge opened in June. It was, at 1,624 m, the world's second longest span, and it carried a four-lane highway that extended onto multispan concrete viaducts on either side for a total crossing of 6.8 km. The bridge is part of an 18-km road-and-rail crossing between Funen and Zealand, Denmark's major islands. Another major bridge in Europe was to be the Rion-Antirion in Greece. Crossing the entrance to the Gulf of Corinth, it was to have three cable-stayed spans and total 2.9 km in length over water up to 62 m deep. In the U.S., particularly in California, attention increasingly was focused on retrofitting and rebuilding bridges so that they would be more resistant to earthquakes. Approaches to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco were being strengthened, and the design for a single-tower suspension bridge and viaduct as the more than $1 billion replacement of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge was approved. ADRIAN LEE GREEMAN BUILDINGS (For Notable Civil Engineering Projects, see Table.) At the Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural Center in Nouma, New Caledonia, which opened in 1998, fingerlike, laminated-wood ribs webbed with a fretwork of iroko wood and enclosing 10 shell-like exhibition pavilions reached toward the sky. Besides evoking the thatched structures of the native Kanak people, the pavilion's airfoil shape and double-wall construction, designed by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (Genoa, Italy), served two purposes. The shape caused prevailing breezes to draw hot air out of the naturally ventilated structures, assisting the infiltration of cooler air from their base, and steel rods and connectors reinforced the two shells against typhoons. In Berlin the Debis tower opened. A 22-story office building, also designed by Piano, it also featured a double-wall construction but one that was technologically sophisticated. Electronic sensors measured temperature, wind, and the Sun's intensity and instructed computerized controls to pivot open a glass outer wall when natural ventilation was needed. On cool days the window wall closed, sealing a 70-cm-wide airspace to insulate the interior (1 cm = 0.39 in). Some areas of the building were shaded by specially fabricated, high-strength terra-cotta rods and panels. These innovations allowed occupants to have highly individualized control of heat, glare, and ventilation, while reducing energy consumption well below the strict European norms. Rehabilitation of Berlin's 1894 Reichstag, which languished as a semi-ruin during the divided-city era, neared completion. It shared with the Tjibaou and Debis projects an increasing architectural focus on environmentally sustainable design and energy conservation. Within restored massive stone walls, the London-based firm, Sir Norman Foster & Partners, designed a glass box as the place where the German parliament will sit. Breezes wafting through a louvered-glass dome atop the Bundestag hall were designed to draw exhaust air up a funnel-like chimney. Mirrors on the exterior of the funnel would reflect daylight deep into the hall, reducing the need for electric light, while a track-mounted sunshade would revolve as the Sun moves, to reduce glare. Exhibitions during the year showcased technological prowess. Portuguese architect Alvaro Siza, working with engineer Cecil Balmond of the Ove Arup Partnership, slung an inches-thin, curved-concrete roof spanning 65 m as a welcoming entrance to Lisbon's Expo '98 (1 m = 3.28 ft). The Millennium Dome, said to be the world's largest at 320 m in diameter, neared completion in Greenwich, east of London. Twelve outward-tilted, 90-m-high masts held tensioned-steel cables, stretching taut a coated, fibreglass roof. The designers were the Richard Rogers Partnership, architect (London), and Buro Happold (Bath, Eng.). The site of the Miho Museum, near Kyoto, Japan, was adjacent to long-sacred landscapes. Pursuant to strict conservation criteria, architect Pei Cobb Freed & Partners placed 80% of the floor area underground, restoring on the roof preexisting landforms and native plantings. About 2,000 piles were driven for the 460-m-high Shanghai World Financial Center, designed by architect Kohn Pedersen Fox of New York City and slated for completion in 2001. Primarily an office building of composite steel and concrete construction, it was to be topped by an observation deck and 10 floors of hotel guest rooms, both reached by double-decked, express elevators. Technological advances in computers and telecommunications technologies began to affect commercial office building design in 1998. Data networking systems increasingly permitted roving workers to plug in phones and computers wherever desired within a building or complex of company facilities. Wireless networks also showed promise, though they remained limited in data capacity and sometimes entailed more wiring than conventional networks. Such technology advances promised a more mobile workplace, where employees increasingly eschew offices and desks for a variety of formal and informal work settings. JAMES S. RUSSELL DAMS (For Notable Civil Engineering Projects, see Table.) Though often considered less valuable than claimed and in many cases environmentally harmful, in 1998 dams continued to be in demand to supply drinking water to the expanding population, for municipal and industrial purposes, and for agriculture. This was evidenced by the completion of 242 dams in 1997 and the 1,738 dams under construction in 1998. The less-developed countries continued to build the largest numbers: India (625), China (302), Turkey (236), and South Korea (145). In the developed nations dam construction slowed considerably, mostly because of the recognition that environmental impacts of the construction had often not been properly considered. A particular focus in this regard was the resettlement of people from areas flooded by dam reservoirs. In China the Three Gorges Dam continued to receive considerable attention because of the 1.3 million people that would be displaced from the reservoir area and the consequent economic damage to them, which had not been addressed adequately. After years of debate, however, the Chinese announced that they had made satisfactory arrangements for the displaced people. This was later confirmed in a report by the World Bank. The World Bank subsequently invited the World Conservation Union to hold a workshop to discuss and develop an agreement on international standards for deciding whether a dam should be built. The Union planned to conduct a review on the effectiveness of large dams in promoting social and economic development. Worldwide in 1998 there were more than 45,000 dams, over 20,000 in China alone. About 80% of these dams were less than 30 m high, and only 1% had heights in excess of 150 m (1 m = 3.28 ft). By type, 75% were earthfill dams, 10% gravity dams, 7% rockfill dams, 6% arch dams, and 2% masonry dams. As of 1998 only 80-85% of the hydroelectric potential had been tapped in the developed countries, and less than 20% had been exploited in the less-developed countries. Approximately 70-80% of the surface water in most less-developed countries was going to waste into the seas and oceans. In Laos, near the Vietnam border, work proceeded on the Nam Theum 2 hydroelectric project. With a capacity of 680 MW, it was expected to generate $250 million per year in revenue from electricity sales. The reservoir was to be 70 km long, cover some 450 sq km, and store three billion cu m of water (1 sq km = 0.386 sq mi; 1 cu m = 35.3 cu ft). Its cost was estimated at $1.2 billion, and it would require the resettlement of 800 families in 17 villages. The government claimed that no family would be inconvenienced during resettlement and none would be worse off after resettlement. Slovakia was pressing Hungary to build a dam on the Danube River so that the Gabcikovo hydroelectric project could be completed. Hungary stopped work on its Nagymaros Dam in 1989 after pressure from environmentalists. Nagymaros is 100 km downstream from Slovakia's Gabcikovo Dam and was needed to deal with river fluctuations caused by the Gabcikovo power output (1 km = 0.62 mi). The 165-m-high Sainte Marguerite 3 Dam was the largest under construction in Canada. An earthfill and rockfill dam 380 m long with a volume content of 6.3 million cu m and due for completion in 2001, it was to provide 882 MW of power. In the U.S. the 168-m-high Seven Oaks Dam in southern California was scheduled for completion in 1999. In 1998 the U.S. Congress ordered that their effect on wildlife and recreation be considered rather than their power output alone, when existing dams needed to be relicensed. T.W. MERMEL ROADS (For Notable Civil Engineering Projects, see Table.) One of the biggest highway spending programs in history was approved by the U.S. Congress in 1998. The six-year infrastructure program, totaling $217 billion, would pay for new and reconstructed roads, bridges, and mass-transit systems across the nation and correct inequities in the formula for distributing highway funds by ensuring that no state would get back less than 91 cents for each dollar of gasoline taxes paid into the federal highway trust fund. The International Road Federation (IRF) praised the U.S. investment, and Switzerland cautioned that if European Union (EU) countries failed to follow the U.S. example and unblock road spending programs, they risked falling to third place behind the U.S. and Southeast Asia in global competition. In June the EU approved more than $500 million for its Trans-European Networks, with 62% of the fund targeted for rail projects. Though the U.K. government planned to reduce road-building projects, it gave its consent for the construction of Great Britain's first private tollway, a $1 billion bypass of Birmingham. The project won legal clearance after protesters lost their suit, claiming that the government acted unlawfully in giving the go-ahead for the scheme. The IRF also made further progress in relaunching infrastructure development in Central Asia and the Caucasus, following the successful Silk Road Conference in Azerbaijan on Sept. 7-8, 1998. The IRF, which functions as two separate organizations--one based in Washington, D.C., and the other in Geneva--would become a single global organization on Jan. 1, 1999. Despite the economic crises in Southeast Asia, a huge road-building program in China appeared undisturbed. By 2010 an estimated 90 million more Chinese would be able to afford a car, and construction work was underway to complete two north-south and two east-west highways. In 1998 China became the largest borrower of investment loans ($2.6 billion) from the World Bank. China also slated $6 billion for new road projects in Hong Kong. In Pakistan work started on the 154-km (1 km = 0.62 mi) section of the M-1 expressway from Peshawar to Islamabad. The road, valued at $430 million, would form part of a 1,300-km expressway from Peshawar in the north to Karachi in the south. Another section of the road opened--the $1 billion, 357-km Lahore-Islamabad expressway. In neighbouring India, where 80% of passenger and 60% of freight movement was by road, authorities were told by the World Bank that it would be prepared to allocate $1 billion to finance badly needed road construction. Following devastating floods, Bangladesh received $273 million, the largest-ever credit from the World Bank for road rehabilitation and maintenance projects. Bangladesh also witnessed the opening of Bangabandhu Bridge--a 4.8-km, more than $900 million structure over the Jamuna River--which physically linked the east and west. Other highway bridge openings included the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge in Japan, part of a system of bridges linking the islands of Honshu and Shikoku (its main span of 1,991 m made it the longest suspension bridge in the world); the 17-km-long Vasco da Gama structure (including 12.3 km of viaducts) over the Tagus River in Lisbon; and the 6.8-km East Bridge in Denmark, which completed the $6.5 billion Great Belt (Store Blt) project linking two islands. (See Bridges, above.) PATRICK SMITH See also Spotlight: Latin America's New Transportation Links; TRANSPORTATION: Sidebar. TUNNELS (For Notable Civil Engineering Projects, see Table.) Transportation created the greatest need for tunneling in 1998. Roads, railways, and urban mass transit systems throughout the world required tunnels, not as a last resort or only option through hills and mountains or under waterways but as the alternative of choice to satisfy a growing number of public and engineering concerns, including protection of the environment, a reduction of noise in urban and residential areas, and heightened awareness for security against the increased risk of terrorist attack. The use of tunnels to protect the environment was best illustrated by the new road project in Paris, where two long tunnels totaling 17.7 km were to provide the final link in the A86 ring road around Paris and preserve the natural beauty of the Seine River valley and countryside near the palace of Versailles (1 km = 0.62 mi). One of the two tunnels, at 10.1 km long and 11.6 m in outer diameter, would be the first to employ a double-deck design for the exclusive use of automobiles that would provide three lanes in each direction on each deck (1 m = 3.28 ft). The second, 7.6 km long and 10.67 m in outer diameter, would provide a conventional two-lane interior, one lane in each direction, for trucks and other large vehicles. The project was expected to be completed by 2005. Other outstanding road tunnels under construction during 1998 included the Lrdal Tunnel in Norway, the world's longest road tunnel to date at 24.5 km; the 14.2-m-diameter Elbe Tunnel under the Elbe River in Hamburg, Ger., which used the world's largest full-face soft-ground tunnel boring machine; and the 6.6-km twin-tube bored tunnel under the Westerschelde River in The Netherlands, which was chosen in preference to a bridge or an immersed-tube tunnel to replace ferry services across the busy waterway into the ports of Belgium. In Scandinavia 20 precast concrete elements 176 m long, 40 m wide, and 9 m high were floated out and lowered into a 10-m-deep trench on the seabed to form the 3.8-km immersed-tube tunnel section of the 16-km resund road-and-rail bridge-and-tunnel link across The Sound to the Baltic Sea between Kastrup near Copenhagen and Lernacken near Malm in Sweden. Work started in 1995, and the project was expected to open to traffic in mid-2000. Tunneling has increased significantly on high-speed railways where trains need lines as straight and as flat as possible to maintain speeds of 300 km/h and more. For example, of the new 79-km high-speed line between Florence and Bologna in Italy, 73 km was in a tunnel. Other countries currently building or planning high-speed railways with large portions in tunnels included Germany, Switzerland, Taiwan, France, Spain, Sweden, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. Tunneling for subways was underway in many cities in 1998, including Lisbon, Copenhagen, Los Angeles, London, Madrid, Athens, Paris, Rome, Toronto, Bangkok, Singapore, Shanghai, Beijing, and Delhi, India. Timetables for several tunneling projects were linked to events scheduled to take place in 2000. In Sydney, Australia, a new 10-km railway tunnel link from the airport to the city centre was to be completed and in operation before the start of the Olympic Games in September. In London the Jubilee Line extension of the Underground system was scheduled to open by the end of 1999 in time to carry thousands of visitors expected to celebrate the dawn of the new century at the Millennium Dome in Greenwich. SHANI WALLIS Military Affairs Arms Control and Disarmament. The Indian and Pakistani nuclear tests dismayed the supporters of nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, but there were also some positive developments in regard to this issue. Brazil, which had a covert nuclear weapons program in the 1980s, signed the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which left Israel, Cuba, India, and Pakistan as the only nations that had not signed. The U.K. and France became the first nuclear powers to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. For this treaty to enter into force, it had to be ratified by 44 nuclear or potential nuclear states. Although three of those nations, North Korea, India, and Pakistan, had not signed the treaty, the leaders of the latter two indicated that they might sign if the international economic sanctions imposed on them after their tests were lifted. Russia continued to balk at ratifying the 1993 Strategic Arms Reduction Talks II (START-II) treaty, as many legislators charged that the agreement to cut the Russian and U.S. strategic nuclear arsenal to no more than 3,500 warheads each was biased in favour of the U.S. By late in the year 133 nations had signed the 1997 Ottawa Convention banning the use, stockpiling, production, and transfer of antipersonnel land mines, and 59 had ratified it; as a result the convention would enter into force on March 1, 1999. Some countries, including Germany and the U.K., had already unilaterally banned land-mine use or had eliminated their stockpiles. The U.S. continued to be a holdout, maintaining that antipersonnel mines were needed to defend the demarcation line between North and South Korea. In May the U.S. indicated that it would sign the Ottawa Convention in 2006 once suitable alternatives to the mines had been developed. At the year's end 169 nations had signed or acceded to the Chemical Weapons Convention, which prohibited the development, production, possession, or use of chemical weapons (CW) and mandated the destruction of all CW stockpiles by 2008. The U.S. was in technical noncompliance for much of the year until Congress in October enacted the necessary implementing domestic legislation. Russia, which possessed 40,000 metric tons of CW agents and had the largest declared stockpile, indicated that it would not be able to meet the destruction deadline because of financial problems. United States. (For Approximate Strengths of Selected Regular Armed Forces, see Table.) Last-minute congressional legislation included in the October omnibus appropriations bill provided $9.2 billion in emergency funding for the Defense Department. This increased fiscal 1999 defense appropriations to $278.8 billion, the first real rise in 14 years. The nation's top military leaders had warned that the quick tempo of operations connected with the many U.S. military commitments worldwide was eroding military readiness. Among other worrisome developments, several of the services were unable to meet their reenlistment goals. The air force had 700 fewer pilots than it needed, a shortfall that was projected to grow to 2,000 by 2002. The navy fell 12% short of its fiscal 1998 recruiting goal, a deficit of nearly 7,000 recruits. The Joint Chiefs of Staff had objected that readiness funding in the fiscal 1999 budget was $27 billion too low. The supplemental bill provided an extra $1.1 billion for that category. Once again Congress gave the Pentagon some weapons it had not requested and balked at endorsing two future rounds of base closings that Secretary of Defense William Cohen had urged as necessary to provide savings to help meet procurement and readiness needs. The administration's request for money to continue work on the army's Theater High Altitude Area Defense system was cut nearly in half, as the program continued to have problems. In May the missile failed for the fifth time to intercept a simulated target. Later in the year the army announced that the next test had been postponed until early in 1999. In September the Senate fell one vote short of passing a bill that would have required the administration to deploy a national missile defense system "as soon as technologically feasible." The supplemental bill added $1 billion to the $3.5 billion allocated for ballistic missile defense in the regular appropriations bill. Perhaps signaling the end of the "megamergers" in the defense industry, Lockheed Martin Corp. in July called off its proposed $8.3 billion acquisition of Northrop Grumman Corp. in the face of government opposition. The relative ease with which terrorists or foreign enemies might obtain biological weapons and the threat of nuclear proliferation prompted Pres. Bill Clinton to strengthen the nation's defense against such unconventional threats. U.S. military personnel deployed to the Persian Gulf region were vaccinated against anthrax beginning in March, and in May the program was expanded to cover the total force. National Guard units in 10 states with high urban densities were given special training to assist state and local authorities following a biological, chemical, or nuclear attack. In retaliation for the terrorist bombing attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, navy warships on August 20 launched cruise missile attacks against two facilities thought to be connected with the organization responsible for the embassy bombings: a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan and a chemical factory in Khartoum, Sudan, that was believed to be producing precursors for nerve gas. During the buildup of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf in November, the air force deployed one of its new air expeditionary forces, an integrated package of bomber, fighter, and support aircraft. The new Defense Threat Reduction Agency became operational on October 1. It combined the several defense agencies and offices that had been concerned with arms control and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, such as the On-Site Inspection Agency and the Defense Special Weapons Agency. October's omnibus spending bill included a provision to end the independent status of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency and to incorporate it within the State Department. The remains of the serviceman from the Vietnam War buried in the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery were disinterred and identified as those of air force First Lieut. Michael Blassie. Fifty-three years after the event, retired marine corps major general James L. Day was awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery in action when serving as a corporal during the World War II invasion of Okinawa. A former navy hospital corpsman, Robert R. Ingram, was given the same award for his heroic actions in Vietnam in 1966. Other personnel-related developments were not as positive. Sexual misconduct by instructors and fellow recruits against female recruits during basic training and allegations of adultery continued to be problems. Despite calls for the complete separation of men and women in all the services during basic training, Defense Secretary Cohen in June approved plans that would provide for separate sleeping facilities for men and women but would continue to integrate the sexes in army, navy, and air force basic training units. The marine corps was allowed to retain its established policy of separating the sexes during basic training. In July Cohen issued guidance to standardize the "good order and discipline" policies of the services and to clarify the guidance regarding the offense of adultery. In February a marine corps EA-6B Prowler electronic countermeasures aircraft struck a gondola cable while on a low-level training mission in the Italian Alps, causing the deaths of the 20 skiers who were riding in the gondola. The pilot and navigator of the jet faced a court-martial. In regard to gay rights, advocates charged that the government's "don't ask, don't tell" policy for homosexuals in the military was discriminatory; a federal appeals court in September, however, upheld the policy. Art, Antiques, and Collections The cautionary attitude that had prevailed among collectors and businesses since 1990, when a five-year boom in the art market ended abruptly, was reversed in 1998. Buyers were paying extraordinary prices for superior works of art when they were available. No major private collections were offered for sale, a factor that encouraged new business strategies among auction houses, including mergers and a revamping of the way they did business; Christie's, for example, reorganized its auction categories for 19th- and 20th-century artworks. In an effort to become more global, several auction houses merged. Sotheby's formed a partnership with Leslie Hindman Auctioneers, Chicago (now Sotheby's Midwest); French retail magnate and art collector Franois Pinault bought a controlling interest in Christie's and privatized the firm; and Bonhams of London and William Doyle Galleries in New York City united in order to hold joint sales in those cities. Blockbuster exhibitions showcasing the works of douard Manet, Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, and Jean Renoir deserved much of the credit for healthy attendance at shows. A survey conducted in 1997 by the National Endowment for the Arts found that during a 12-month period half of the United States' adult population--an increase of some 9% since 1992--had participated in at least one of seven arts activities, including musical performances, theatre productions, and museum exhibitions, which were the most popular. A new international appreciation for Australian Aboriginal art resulted in high prices at an auction; some of the works brought as much as $A200,000 (U.S. $120,000) in June. The first North Asian Biennial was mounted in Taiwan at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. The exhibit included works by artists from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and China and represented a reexamination of tradition and national identity. An increase in prices for Latin-American art created a brisk market for forgeries, especially paintings by such Cuban masters as Mario Carreo, Ren Portocarrero, Victor Manuel, Mariano Rodrguez, and Estebn Chartrand. Copies of the paintings of Colombian artist Fernando Botero were also reportedly being turned out en masse in Asia by craftsmen working from photographs. As a result of a rash of forgeries, the works of Argentine artist Antonio Berni were being scrutinized by a newly established authentication committee. In another felonious act a rare book by Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus was stolen in Kiev by a brazen thief at the Vernadsky Central Scientific Library of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. With a copy of the 1543 On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres discreetly tucked away, the culprit walked out of the library on the pretense of smoking a cigarette. British author William Boyd, with the help of his publisher, rock star David Bowie, perpetrated a literary hoax with the publication of a memoir of Nat Tate, who reportedly had been prone to depression and burned most of his paintings before jumping to his death from the Staten Island ferry. It was later revealed, however, following a New York City reception at which many in the art world claimed to have known him (but not very well), that Nat Tate: An American Artist was a work of fiction. REBECCA KNAPP ADAMS