The 2021 Lishui Photography Festival – scheduled to be held on Nov 5-9 in the city of Lishui in East China's Zhejiang province – is expected to offer visitors a wide-ranging cornucopia of creativity from around the planet.

The festival sent out invites on Aug 17 to photographers internationally to submit works to be considered for showing – and the response was reportedly exceptionally gratifying.

On Sept 20, the collections process for works officially ended. Statistics showed that a total of 8,717 photographers and curators from more than 120 countries and regions and 171 organizations signed up to participate, with 6,013 works eventually received.

With the numbers exceeding all previous editions, this year's festival features the most countries ever to participate and the most submitted works.

During the National Day holiday on Oct 1-7, the organizing committee of the festival invited well-known domestic photography experts to serve as judges. They carefully screened through the works, determining that about 850 works that will be exhibited during the festival.