China: portrait of a country

Through the discussion of often startling work, selected from the archives of 88 Chinese photographers, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Liu Heung Shing presents a visual history of the China, sixty years from the founding of the People's Republic in 1949 to the present day.

From the political to the twee, the spectacular to the mundane, the book charts life in China in all its contradictory splendor. The stark horror of Tiananmen Square, the frenetic bustling through the passageways of Shanghai's Xiangyang market and the serene calm of the Great Wall of China at dawn, are all woven together to illustrate the modern history of the People's Republic.

Along with maps, timelines of political events and biogs of the photographers, the pictures tell the story of the last 60 years - from the executions that followed the formation of the People's Republic to the clubbing revolution of the late 90s inspired by the West.

Six chapters, taking a decade at a time, place the images within their historical context. The book begins with the Birth of China, charts the "Great leap backward" during the 1960s, through the suspicion and subversion of the 1970s, and into the modernisation of the '80s and '90s and, finally, the present day.

And the contradictions are no less prevalent today than 60 years ago. A series of images by Hu Yang from 2005 showing ordinary people in their homes in Shanghai speaks volumes about the social economic changes China has undergone in recent years.

Here we see an old couple sitting in a cramped apartment surrounded by a life's-worth of brick-a-brack and clutter alongside an affluent middle aged couple in their "bourgeois" home, and a Chinese yuppie working in advertising relaxing on a contemporary apartment.

China: Portrait of a Country is published in hardback by Taschen

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