A model presents a creation by designer Andreas Kronthaler as part of his Fall-Winter 2023/2024 Women's ready-to-wear collection show for late designer Vivienne Westwood's namesake label during Paris Fashion Week in Paris, France on March 4, 2023. (Photo by Sarah Meyssonnier/Reuters)

British model Cara Delevingne presents a creation for L'Oreal Paris show “Walk Your Worth” as part of the Paris Fashion Week Women Ready-to-wear Spring-Summer 2025 collection at Palais Garnier (Opera national de Paris) opera house, in Paris on September 23, 2024. (Photo by Julien de Rosa/AFP Photo)

(L-R) Models Jasmine Tookes, Paloma Elsesser, Barbara Palvin and Ashley Graham prepare backstage at the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2024 on October 15, 2024 in New York City. (Photo by Arturo Holmes/Getty Images for Victoria's Secret)

Models kiss the back of another model, with a message on her back, during the grand finale of Lotus Make-up India Fashion Week based on “Rainbow” theme, an emblem for the LGBTQ community, in New Delhi, India, Sunday, October 14, 2018. According to Fashion Design Council of India, the “Rainbow” show, wherein 40 designers showcased their creations, was a tribute to mark the historic judgement by the Supreme Court of India which struck down a colonial-era law that made homosexual acts punishable by up to 10 years in prison. (Photo by Altaf Qadri/AP Photo)

Taken by photographer, Denis Budkov, 33, the Plosky Tolbachik is one of a cluster of volcanoes located in the Kamchatka Peninsula in the far east of Russia. After taking a lucky group of tourists to the crater of the flat volcano, the Russian photographer managed to get less than 300 metres away from the spurting jets of lava. Photo: The underground entrance to the volcano resembles a scene from the latest Hobbit movie. (Photo by Denis Budkov/Caters News)

To produce the images that convey his fatalistic and ironic approach to life, tinged with hope, he needed the environment and knowledge of Mother Russia, oiled with a bit of bribery to certain circus trainers. Enter the Great Russian Bear, the personification of Russia for the last several centuries, onto center stage and into his studio. The bear is recognized as both brutish and cute – Misha was the mascot for the 1980 Olympic Games – and has remained a symbol of Russia since Tsarist times. In 2009 it is the symbol of the United Russia Party.

“Lombard Street is an east-west street in San Francisco, California. Lombard Street is best known for the one-way section on Russian Hill between Hyde and Leavenworth Streets, in which the roadway has eight sharp turns (or switchbacks) that have earned the street the distinction of being the crookedest street in the world”. – Wikipedia

Photo: A single car drives down a typically crowded Lombard Street, San Francisco's crooked street, April 29, 2003 in San Francisco. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

A model presents a hairstyle during the 7th international festival of hairdressing art, fashion and design called “Crystal Angel” in Kiev, Ukraine, on April 18, 2013. (Photo by Gleb Garanich/Reuters)