WASHINGTON, DC.- The life of China’s Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-1908) was anything but conventional. She rose in power from a low-ranking imperial concubine to Grand Empress Dowager of the Qing court, reigning as sovereign to more than 400 million people for more than 45 years. “Power | Play: China’s Empress Dowager” is on view at the Smithsonian’s Arthur M. Sackler Gallery through Jan. 29, 2012. The exhibition presents 19 stunning photographic portraits of the Empress Dowager created from the Freer and Sackler Archives’ collection of original and unique glass negatives. The portraits reveal a ruler who, in an attempt to control her public persona, seized on the emerging technology of photography to shape her image on the world stage. On public display for the first time, the life-sized portraits bring visitors face-to-face with one of