photos from china

The Forbidden City, Beijing

The National Centre for the Performing Arts

In the shadow of the Forbidden City

The Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, part of the Temple of Heaven

Lighting incense at Beijing's Lama Temple

The Great Wall, at Badaling

Yonghe Lamasery

Soldier, Great Wall

Ever-present construction, downtown Beijing

IN 2010 I spent a week at a conference at Beijing's Peking University, after which I took a few days off to do the rounds of the city's classic tourist sights: the Forbidden City, the Great Wall (thanks Zhaohuan!), Tianamen Square, and some of the beautiful temples to religions past and current. Unquestionably one of the world's great cities, this is a rich but challenging place to photograph - an urban Yosemite Valley where it's hard to escape the wealth of associations that mention of China brings instantly to mind. At best, I managed mostly stock images and cliches on my own brief visit, though I'm quite fond of the smoker checking his mobile outside the gates of the Forbidden City.