Photographer Wang Yuanling rose very early in the morning to battle the darkness and cold for one photograph of a gate leading into a northern

Chinese village of the Henan Province. He wished to capture its colorful, glowing entrance before the crowds and hubbub of the Spring Festival, or Chinese New Year, began pouring into the streets for annual festivities. An important aspect of Chinese culture, the festival, like the village gate, are markers of identity and tradition. Exploring the relationship between the past and present in modern day China, Yuanling’s series captures a contrasting world of memory and progress.

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