West German police arrest a young man, one of the angry crowd throwing stones at a bus full of Soviet guards making their way to the Soviet War Memorial, 20th August 1962. The crowd were incensed by the death of 18-year-old Peter Fechter, who was shot while trying to cross the Berlin Wall a few days earlier. (Photo by Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

An young exhibitor chases his wayward pig during the Great Yorkshire Show on July 12, 2011 in Harrogate, England. The annual Great Yorkshire Show has attracted a record number of 12,700 livestock entries over the three day event. The show now in its 153rd year is Britain's leading agricultural gathering, where over 125,000 visitors come to celebrate the farming community and their way of life. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

A Japanese twenty-year-old woman enjoys a cigarette during the annual Coming-of-Age Day ceremony at Toshimaen Amusement Park on January 11, 2010 in Tokyo, Japan. 1.27 million young people celebrate their passage into adulthood on the day while they become eligible to drink alcohol, smoke and vote at the age of 20. (Photo by Koichi Kamoshida/Getty Images)

Born in Russia where he was educated in fine arts from a young age, Rinat Shingareev took an early interest in the subject, for which he showed an affinity and talent. Later moving to Italy to attend the Fine Arts Academy he has been described by Italian Maxim as “one of the most talented artists in the world”. Now based in London Shingareev continues to paint vibrant and thought provoking pieces.

Russian pop art photographer Sergey Chilikov captures a nation liberated from the social oppression of late-era Soviet rule – at parties, in the streets, and bouncing high. His exhibition, Photoprovocations, will be at Photo London, 19-22 May. Here: Yoshkar-Ola, Matrosova Street (1995). (Photo by Sergey Chilikov)

An employee in a bookshop adjusts packaged cigarettes which have to be sold in identical olive-brown packets bearing the same typeface and largely covered with graphic health warnings, with the same style of writing so the only identifier of a brand will be the name on the packet, in Sydney on December 1, 2012. A new world-first law forcing tobacco companies to sell cigarettes in identical packets came into effect Saturday in Australia in an effort to strip any glamour from smoking and prevent young people from taking up the habit. (Photo by William West/AFP Photo)

Travel photographer Amos Chapple recently crossed into Turkmenistan on a three-day transit visa and was able to photograph many of the sights and monuments in Ashgabat, the capital and largest city. Turkmenistan is a single-party country, a former Soviet state, run by a president at the center of a cult of personality.

Photo: A young couple leave the Alem Entertainment Center in Ashgabat. The current president has a history of breaking obscure records. In 2012 the wheel atop this complex was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's largest enclosed Ferris wheel. The structure was built at a cost of $90m. (Photo by Amos Chapple via The Atlantic)

Pope Francis greets the crowd from his popemobile in downtown Rio de Janeiro. Pope Francis touched down in Rio de Janeiro on Monday, starting his first foreign trip as pontiff and a weeklong series of events expected to attract more than a million people to a gathering of young faithful in Brazil, home to the world's largest Roman Catholic population. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters)