These poignant portraits look to shine awareness on the plight of some of the world’s most endangered ecosystems and species of wildlife. The images combine animals, art and celebrity, with Asia's top models posing with the likes of rhinos, giraffes, leopards and marine life. Here: Mikki Yao with an Asian Elephant. (Photo by Sean Lee-Davies/Caters News)

At the end of rice harvesting season, the folks of the Kagawa and Niigata Prefectures in Japan hold a straw festival to celebrate the abundance of the harvest. Dried straws cover wooden frames to form larger-than-life sculptures from animals like sharks and gorillas to vessels such as ships and tanks. The family-friendly event invites visitors of all ages to engage, interact, and play on the enormous structures.

Factory landlord Lawrence Taylor (L), portraying a Colour Sergeant from the King's Royal Rifle Corps, part of the Rifles Living History Society, performs a drill with Connor Young (R) of the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment Living History Group as they recreate the life of a First World War soldier at the Eden Valley Museum in Edenbridge in southeast England May 10, 2014. Lawrence has always had an interest in military history and specifically “The Rifles” – his veteran father's WWII regiment. When he became a re-enactor he chose not to re-enact WWII as many of the veterans are still alive, and he felt uncomfortable as he remembers his father would have flashbacks and nightmares about the war. United by a fascination with military history and a fondness for dressing up, groups such as the Rifles Living History Society and the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment Living History Group get together to recreate aspects of life during the First World War. Reuters photographer Luke MacGregor photographed members of the groups, both as they took part in living history events and at their day jobs. (Photo by Luke MacGregor/Reuters)

This is the incredible moment a fierce lightning bolt crashed against the Grand Canyon illuminating the steep canyon walls. Shrouded in darkness, the breath-taking landscape was shocked into life as mother nature sent the bolt storming down to Earth. As it cracked against the rocks the bright blue bolt illuminated the South Rim of the canyon, considered one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. With just the Desert View Watchtower in the foreground, the lightning was perfectly framed by the canyon which is located in Arizona, USA. (Photo by Travis Roe/U.S. Dept. of the Interior/Caters News)

“Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa or simply Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, and illustrator, whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of fin de siècle Paris yielded an œuvre of exciting, elegant and provocative images of the modern and sometimes decadent life of those times. Toulouse-Lautrec is known along with Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin as one of the greatest painters of the Post-Impressionist period. In a 2005 auction at Christie's auction house a new record was set when “La blanchisseuse”, an early painting of a young laundress, sold for $22.4 million U.S” – Wikipedia.

Photo: Full-length portrait of French artist Henri Toulouse-Lautrec wearing an overcoat, a bowler hat, and pince-nez eyeglasses while holding a cane. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images). Circa 1895

Tsewang Dolma, 33, a farmer and housewife poses for a photograph in Matho, a village nestled high in the Indian Himalayas, India September 29, 2016. When asked how living in the world's fastest growing major economy had affected life, Dolma replied: “Our culture is spoiled now. We don't wear our traditional dress”. (Photo by Cathal McNaughton/Reuters)

The Sea Life Trust team move Beluga Whale Little Gray from a tugboat during transfer to the bayside care pool where they will be acclimatised to the natural environment of their new home at the open water sanctuary in Klettsvik Bay in Iceland on August 7, 2020. The two Beluga whales, named Little Grey and Little White, are being moved to the world's first open-water whale sanctuary after travelling from an aquarium in China 6,000 miles away in June 2019. (Photo by Aaron Chown/PA Images via Getty Images)

A Ballet Paraisópolis student wearing a face mask rehearses amidst the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic on August 13, 2020 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The Ballet Paraisópolis is a project that teaches dance to children and young people in the Paraisópolis community in order to encourage them to seek better life opportunities. Founded in 2012 by ballerina, teacher and choreographer, Monica Tarragó, Ballet Paraisópolis has a total of 200 students and another 2,000 on the waiting list. (Photo by Alexandre Schneider/Getty Images)