Taking a tour of the Silk Road
By Trevor Williams | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-05-05 23:52
It took Michael Yamashita a few minutes to realize why he was at the Carter Center in Atlanta.
Then the longtime National Geographic photographer, who is said to have one of the world's largest catalogues of Asian images, saw a picture of US President Jimmy Carter shaking hands with Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping.
"I walked into the museum here and I thought, ‘Yes, now I get it,'" he said.
The Silk Road Journey exhibition in late March presented Yamashita's breathtaking shots covering epic expeditions of explorers from different epochs and backgrounds — one who "discovered" China and another who made the country's innovative prowess known to the outside world.
Over five years, Yamashita retraced the trail of 13th-century Venetian explorer Marco Polo to Yuan Dynasty (1279-1371), passing through Central Asia and working his way through the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.
Later, the award-winning photographer traveled the "sea silk road" established by Zheng He, the Yunnan-born admiral who took Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) trade ambitions throughout Southeast Asia and all the way to East Africa.
"Zheng is the world's greatest explorer that no one knows anything about," Yamashita said.
