GONGTAN ~ Gone Forever!
Nestled beneath the Wuling Mountains and overlooking the jade shoals of the Wu Jiang River, rustic Gongtan was founded in 200AD and was home to the region’s Tujia minority people. For centuries accessible only by boat, the Ming Dynasty-era estates were constructed entirely out of wood and perched on stilts against the steep palisades. Unfortunately, the 2,000 year-old architecture was fated for the pyres of modernization when the municipality’s local government bulldozed the village to build the Pengshui Hydro Power Plant. R.I.P Gongtan!
Thank you for supporting photojournalist Tom Carter's CHINA: Portrait of a People, the most comprehensive book of photography on modern China ever published by a single author.
In the 1009 or 2009? Villages and Cities of Today's CHINA photo essay.
2 responses
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Tom Carter added a link (7 Dec 2008):
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Donald Garrett gave props (7 Dec 2008):
This is a wonderful capture. Love the composition. This is another proof that all great photos are not necessarily blue sky and sun!
