Multimedia

Nine years ago, photographer Katharina Hesse began to make portraits of North Korean defectors. To protect their identities, she allows them to conceal their faces, asking only that they “give something” of themselves to the photographs. And they do...

Hong Kong rose up as the essential gateway into Communist China over the second half of the twentieth century—a British-run laissez-faire playground whose bottom-line pragmatism proved lucrative for all, maintaining a fluid, delicate balance between...

Decades of unprecedented economic growth have affected the lives of more than a generation of mainland Chinese and reshaped the urban structure of cities. China has become one of the most exciting and permissive places in the world to practice...

Tucked amidst the factories and shops of of the Longgang district of the southern boomtown of Shenzhen sits a handful of narrow Qing Dynasty lanes collectively called Wuwucun, after the original Hakka minority Wu clan who established the village in...

President Barack Obama’s visit to Yangon (also known as Rangoon) today shines a spotlight on a story that has already captured the world’s attention: namely, the remarkable political transformation that has been underway over the past year in...

The photographer James Whitlow Delano says he finds beauty in melancholy. For more than two decades, he has sought it out around the edges of the often ebullient story of China’s economic rise. His book Empire: Impressions from China,...

Seven days a week eight hours a day, the members of the Sanjin Shanxi Opera Troupe impersonate princes, generals, and emperors. These performers are keeping alive one of China’s oldest traditions: its opera. Almost every region of the country has...

“Heteroscapes” is a portrait of China’s contemporary urban spaces and landscapes during a period of transition. Through the economic boom of the past twenty years, these changes have shifted social power structures and subverted once common values...

While village elections are widespread in China, it’s rare for the Party not to exert pressure over the selection of candidates. When the Guangdong province village of Wukan held elections in February and March 2012, however, they were notably free...

Approximately 100-120 million Chinese live with chronic hepatitis B infection. Most acquired the disease at birth, through transmission from an infected mother, or during early childhood. Hepatitis B has touched the lives of virtually every family...

Tiananmen Square. Center of China, theater set of the Chinese Communist Party’s biggest political shows, Mecca of millions and yet a void in the city. No Beijinger in his right mind would ever suggest “meet me at the Square.” Tourists find no place...

In Aguwa village, Yunnan province, the Mosuo continue to practice their ancient tradition of matriarchy. Women rule the tightly-knit families as heads of households, while men practice “walking marriages,” fathering children whom they seldom help...