Harbin’s Ice and Snow Festival returns with competitions and glowing sculptures
HARBIN, China (AP) — Each January, sculptors converge in Harbin, the capital of Heilongjiang province in frigid northeastern China, to compete for the best ice sculpture at the annual Ice and Snow Festival.
Some visitors say Harbin already has plenty of ice, but the festival brings artists to the city anyway, near China’s border with Russia, to carve more and to show it off in a large public display. Sculptors work through the cold season to build pieces that organizers and attendees can judge side by side.
The setting is described as dreamlike, with sculptures lit from within. Organizers say that as a section of the city is illuminated, the area can resemble a holiday television special, with families traveling in winter conditions to see the display.
Families from distant places come to look at the sculptures and then continue on with their plans while bundled up for the weather. The focus of the festival remains the ice art itself, even as the larger city becomes part of the viewing experience.
AP photographs taken Saturday show an ice sculptor preparing his work for competition at the festival. The pictures also depict people approaching icy steps of an obelisk sculpture glowing in yellow and purple.
By Sunday, AP photos show competitors putting final touches on their pieces at the Ice and Snow Festival, alongside other scenes of visitors approaching and walking through the ice display. Other AP images show a Wolf Supermoon rising over ice structures in the festival area.
AP photos taken Sunday also include a scene of a security guard dwarfed by a huge ice structure. In another segment of the AP coverage, the photos show crowds continuing to visit the festival installations.
The festival continues until mid-February. Organizers also note that visitors can go swimming amid the ice, if they want to.