Garden of Perfect Brightness

Garden Of Perfect Brightness is a new film by Yoeri Guépin that situates itself in the only remaining ruins of the destroyed Summer Palace of the Qing Dynasty located in the Haidian district in Beijing. In 1860 British and French troops sacked and burned the Yuanmingyuan complex which consisted of 800 acres full of exquisite gardens, architectural heights and precious art objects. Under the command of the infamous British Lord Elgin more than a million objects were looted, which are now on display in more than fifty different European museums, mainly in Britain and France. The violent event marked the end of the second opium war and the start of the ruination of the imperial complex.