At this year’s Venice Bienniale in Italy, the Korean pavilion has a curious exhibit called “Commissions for Utopia”. It includes renderings from North Korea’s top architects and artists (all anonymous), many of whom studied at the Paekho Institute of Architecture, North Korea’s state-run architectural college, and none of whom have ever left the country. They were asked to create a vision of North Korea’s future sustainable architecture for its expanding tourism industry. Their final products are a glimpse into what it would be like to envision the future after being entirely cut off from the present for almost 70 years. (Photo by Nick Bonner/Kyle Vanhemert/Venice Architecture Biennale)

Performers wearing 19th century French military uniforms fire their weapons as they attack Allied forces during a reenactment of the Battle of the Nations, in a field in the village of Markkleeberg near Leipzig October 20, 2013. The east German city of Leipzig commemorated the 200th anniversary of the largest battle of the Napoleonic Wars on Sunday by reenacting the Battle of the Nations, with 6,000 military-historic association enthusiasts from all over Europe. The decisive encounter in which tens of thousands of soldiers were killed, took place from October 17-19, 1813, just outside of Leipzig. At the height of the hostilities Napoleon fielded more than 200,000 men against an Allied force of some 360,000 soldiers which included troops from Russia, Austria, Prussia and Sweden. (Photo by Fabrizio Bensch/Reuters)

“This is the terrifying moment a diver came head to head with a shark as it swims inches away snatching a bite for dinner. The close encounter, captured off Bimini Island in the Bahamas, shows the hammerhead approaching diver Eli Martinez who bravely stands his ground as the giant beast approaches. Eli, free diving outside of a protective cage, carefully handled the sea creature despite its menacing razor-sharp teeth – but admitted they are extremely shy and need a lot of work to allow divers close to them. After multiple trips and hours of diving nearby they finally got used to Eli in January this year – hammerheads regularly visit these waters during the winter season”. – Caters News. Photo: Eli Martinez with hammerhead shark. (Photo by J. P. Zegarra/Caters News)

“The titan arum or Amorphophallus titanum (from Ancient Greek amorphos, “without form, misshapen” + phallos, “phallus”, and titan, “giant”) is a flowering plant with the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world. The titan arum's inflorescence is not as large as that of the Talipot palm, Corypha umbraculifera, but the inflorescence of the Talipot palm is branched rather than unbranched”. – Wikipedia

Photo: Kew Gardens employee Lauren Bird Royal examines the flowering of the Titan Arum lily at the Botanical Gardens at Kew on September 30, 2005 in London, England. For the first time in horticultural history, the Titan Arum lily can be seen at all three active stages in its lifecycle – in flower, fruit and leaf.The flowering corm is nearly three metres tall and weighs 91kg and is very rarely seen outside of the rainforests of Sumatra, Indonesia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images)

Devotees bow to a passingTibetan Buddhist monk on his way to take part in a special prayer during Monlam or the Great Prayer rituals on March 5, 2015 at the Labrang Monastery, Xiahe County, Amdo, Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Gansu Province, China. Labrang Monastery is one of the six great monasteries of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism and one of the largest outside of the Tibetan Autonomous Region. Monlam, the most important prayer event for many Tibetans was banned during the Cultural Revolution in China but once again in recent years it is celebrated in many areas. (Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)

There isn’t exactly a college out there for face painting so Elsa Rhae Pageler‘s talent is as raw as it comes. Perhaps what’s even more amazing is that the video editor and producer from Kansas City graduated with a degree in Film and Media Studies and only does face painting and airbrushing as a side job. An application may take anywhere from 1 to 3 hours and apart from outside gigs, she features video tutorials on her YouTube channel showing how she paints herself to recreate video game and fictional characters. Photo: “Face Palm”. (Photo by Elsa Rhae Pageler)

Deputies of the opposition fight with deputies of the majority for a second time in two days, during the second session of the newly elected Ukrainian parliament in Kiev on December 13, 2012. (Photo by Sergei Supinsky/AFP Photo)

A porter stands at the bottom of the Illimani mountain, on the outskirts of La Paz, Bolivia, April 16, 2016. For years, Lydia Huayllas, 48, has worked as a cook at base camps and mountain-climbing refuges on the steep, glacial slopes of Huayna Potosi, a 19,974-foot (6,088-meter) Andean peak outside of La Paz, Bolivia. But two years ago, she and 10 other Aymara indigenous women, ages 42 to 50, who also worked as porters and cooks for mountaineers, put on crampons – spikes fixed to a boot for climbing – under their wide traditional skirts and started to do their own climbing. (Photo by David Mercado/Reuters)