Meier's Modernist Museum Shocks Rome

In a recent NPR program, architect Richard Meier admitted that his mission to design a museum for the ancient Roman Ara Pacis (Alter of Peace) was "intimidating." The glass and marble building certainly has stirred controversy. Protestors say that the modernist structure is not in keeping with the alter, which was erected by the Emperor Augustus in the first century B.C. But Walter Veltroni, the mayor of Rome, says, "Rome is a city that's growing and doesn't fear what is new."
• Roman 'Altar of Peace' Survives Aesthetic War, on NPR
• Richard Meier
• Architecture of Ancient Rome