Martin Stavars: Megalopolis

Megalopolis compiles images by Polish photographer Martin Stavars (born 1981) from 14 cities--Dubai, Incheon, Seoul, Busan, Chongging, Shanghai, Singapore, London, Toronto, Montreal, Tokyo, Paris, Hong Kong and Istanbul. Stavar's precise, almost surgical black-and-white images highlight the complex networks of the world's largest metropolises.

Mr. Stavars captures the rise-quite literally-of cities around the world. A motorcyclist rides on an empty road in Shanghai, where the pollution is so dense that the bulbous needle of the Oriental Pearl Tower is barely visible. In Dubai, the gaudy, copied-and-pasted Jumeirah Beach Residence looks like honeycombs conjured out of the desert sand. The photographer knows how to make this new urbanism seem both thrilling and precarious: As Europe's crisis-addled master planners will tell their flush Emirati and Chinese counterparts, even the best-laid plans have a way of foundering. (The Editors The Wall Street Journal 2013-02-22)