With the close of the on-site exhibitions of the 2021 Lishui Photography Festival, the biennial festival officially dropped its curtain on Dec 5.

Since the on-site event opened on Nov 17, the Lishui Photography Festival reportedly attracted extensive attention from the world's photographic community.

As the 10th session this year – with its theme "Integrate City Life into Nature" – the festival aimed to promote the development of global photographic art and cultural exchanges. It also aimed to pay tribute to the outstanding contributions and important achievements made by the world's photographic artists, as well as to build up Lishui's reputation as a famous international photographic city.

During the festival, top photography masters Ellie Young, Christina Z. Anderson, Elizabeth Opalenik and Sam Wang called the world's classical artists together and plans to build the International Classical Craft Imaging Center was in Lishui.

The Lishui center will help facilitate creations by resident international artists, paving the way for exhibitions of major works, art exchanges and other regular activities after it is opened.

In 2004, the first Lishui Photography Festival was held with the efforts of the whole city – to make Lishui more appealing to the world over and to enable its abundant photographic resources to inspire the best artistic works of both Chinese and foreign photographers.

As a result, it's been said that through the outstanding pieces and social influence of its artists, the influence of Lishui's natural scenery, historical charms, ethnic customs and urban and rural new appearance has been spread widely.

After 17 years of perseverance and development, the Lishui Photography Festival is widely acclaimed to have become a golden calling card for cultural exchanges between China and the world's photography community. It is said to have not only opened a window onto Lishui, but also promoted a "Cultural Silk Road" for Lishui's photography art to the world.