An elderly woman in a dark winter coat, wearing a white face mask, brushes snow from a carved marble step in a Beijing palace courtyard. The image captures an everyday ritual of clearing snow in the historic grounds, framed by the worn edges of centuries-old stone.
In Beijing’s palace grounds, the work of clearing snow is older than any living memory. The carved stone beneath her feet remembers the Ming dynasty, the Qing, the Republican period, and now this quiet December morning. She clears the snow as a thousand people have done before her, without ceremony.
