Photographs by Robert Capa, Lois Conner, Stuart Franklin, Zhang Hai-er, Wu Jialin, Wang Jinsong, Hiroji Kubota, Sebastião Salgado, Liu Heung Shing, and Others

A stirring tribute to china's land and people, and a lasting vision of the country within.

To commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, Aperture is publishing Imaging China. This magnificent volume unfolds a series of in-depth portfolios by twenty of the most important Chinese and Western photographers of the era, conveying the extent of their involvement in politics, culture, and everyday life. Together with texts by leading thinkers, writings by the photographers, and selections of ancient and modern poetry, this collection offers profound insight into a country that has been closed to the West for more than half of its existence.

Drawn to China by its dramatic upheavals and its rich cultural legacy, the world's greatest photographers offer thrilling proof of the power of photography to explore-and convey-the human experience. From France's Henri Cartier-Bresson, present at the creation of the Republic in 1949, to China's Liu Heung Shing, who chronicled a society in transition following the death of Mao Tse-tung, to Wu Jialin and Stuart Franklin working today, the image makers represented here have created visions of China as broad and diverse as the country and its society. Imaging China is an extraordinary visual exploration of an extraordinary place and time.