Li Zhensheng was born in 1940 in Dalian, Liaoning Province, China. After early studies as a cinematographer at Changchun, Jilin, he began working as a photographer for the Heilongjiang Daily in northeastern China, where he stayed for over nineteen years before beginning a teaching career at the International Political Science Institute of the University of Beijing.
His 2003 chronicle of the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) Red-Color News Soldier: A Chinese Photographer's Odyssey Through the Cultural Revolution (Phaidon 2003), has been translated into six languages and received the Overseas Press Club of America’s Olivier Rebbot Award for Best Photographic Reporting from Abroad. An exhibition of his images from the Cultural Revolution has appeared in nearly every major European capital and continues to travel around the world. His collection has been represented worldwide by Contact Press Images since 1999. He is based in Beijing and New York.