The 2013 Beijing International Photography Week opens today at the China Millennium Monument in Beijing's Xicheng District. With the theme "Photography: World in Focus," the photo week will present a series of exhibitions, lectures, forums and themed activities at the main venue, as well as at the 798 Art Zone, Caochangdi Art Zone, Wangfujing Pedestrian Street and Cable 8 Creative Culture Zone.

The centerpiece of the program is the First Beijing International Photography Bienniale, organized by Photo Week in collaboration with the CAFA Art Museum. The Bienniale also opens today, and continues through December 7^th. The event will highlight academics and innovation in photography, led by a curatorial team comprised of Gu Zheng, Li Mei, Rong Rong, Cai Meng, and Bas Vroege.

More than 1,000 photography masters and professionals from over 20 countries and regions, including the U.S., the U.K., France, Italy, South Africa and South Korea, have been invited to share their expertise on photography.


The CAFA Art Museum, designed by Arata Isozaki, on the campus of the China Central Academy of Fine Arts, is the organizing institution of the First Beijing International Photography Bienniele.

The theme of the Bienniale is Aura and Post-Aura, a key theme from Walter Benjamin’s writings on aesthetics. In a recent interview in Beijing, curator Cai Meng said, “Since he coined the term, it has been used to differentiate classical art from modern art. In today’s ‘post-aura’ art, we are in the process of imitating, reconstructing, spreading, and creating a new set of artistic values and standards through a manmade, sociological ‘aura.’

“The thematic exhibition is ‘Chinese Photography Since 2009,’ which will present a selection of work that is richer and more varied than that of any other period since 1949,” he continued. “The international exhibition ‘A Point on the Map’ presents the most interesting aspects of Western photography in the last few years.

“We have included independent exhibition spaces and cultural contexts, still and moving images, texts, and sound, the media that link these independent spaces, such as the Internet, iPads, or installations, as well as compatible multimedia platforms, Cai concluded. “Local narratives and non-professional videos bring to us the reality of the ‘post-aura’ era, an issue that everyone needs to examine more closely.”


The 798 Art Zone, Beijing's "East Village," is another host for the Beijing International Photography Biennieale.

Among the contemporary works on view are images lent by the Chinese-American collector Charles Jin, including masterworks by Harry Callahan, Robert Mapplethorpe, Sally Mann, Cindy Sherman, and Andreas Gursky, among others.

Public programs include two symposia, an international symposium entitled “Photography and the Art System” and a youth symposium entitled “Aura and Post-Aura: New Issues for New Photography.” A seminar entitled “An Era of Photography, Mass Media, and Social Media” will address how the emergence of microblogs, WeChat, and other social media has changed methods of social interaction and the transmission and function of photographs. Information.