Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
As China shifted from a small-farm economy to an industrial powerhouse over the past generation, there’s been an enormous demographic shift, with some 282 million migrant labourers splitting their time between cities and their rural homes. For Wo Guo Jie, who makes her living in Shanghai collecting styrofoam boxes from markets and reselling them to a seafood wholesale market, this transformation has meant spending as many as three years at a time away from her family farm, where her children sometimes barely recognise her when she returns. Part of a video series on work in modern China by the Shanghai-based photographer and filmmaker Noah Sheldon, Styrofoam follows Guo over the course of a day’s collecting. Working under the cover of night to limit police attention, she’s still a highly conspicuous sight on the city streets, biking with as many boxes stacked around her as possible so that she has to make only one trip a day.
video
Wellbeing
Born in China, Zee seeks a gender-affirming life in the American Midwest
11 minutes
video
Rituals and celebrations
A whale hunt is an act of prayer for an Inuit community north of the Arctic Circle
8 minutes
video
Politics and government
How it looked to Afghan women to see the Taliban return to power
33 minutes
video
Biography and memoir
Passed over as the first Black astronaut, Ed Dwight carved out an impressive second act
13 minutes
video
The ancient world
The six priestesses who kept the flame of ancient Rome alight at risk of death
5 minutes
video
Engineering
A close-up look at electronic paper reveals its exquisite patterns – and limitations
9 minutes
video
Architecture
West Africa was once an architectural laboratory. Is it time for a revival?
12 minutes
video
Work
A Swedish expat in the Philippines wonders: what’s up with people sleeping at work?
14 minutes
video
Art
‘If you’re creative, why can’t you create a solution?’ One artist’s imaginative activism
17 minutes