“Most recently, the bushy beard’s masculinity has been turned off and instead adorned with flower power. A wacky new trend sees hipsters weave foliage into their facial hair. It’s emerging across boho America. Yes, men in Brooklyn, Portland and San Francisco are adorning their faces with blossoms, seemingly for the sole purpose of artistic portraits that have been taking over the social media with the hashtag #flowerbeards. It started gaining popularity on the social platform of Tumblr, when a blogger began “Will It Beard” project, and has since blossomed elsewhere around the Internet”. – Linda Sharkey via The Independent. (Photo by designsquish/Tumblr)

Italian pencil artist Marco Mazzoni‘s work goes far beyond technical perfection. His representation of historical healing women is enigmatic and sublime. Often leaving the eyes blank or covered with an abundance of birds, butterflies and flowers, he gives the impression of a deeper inward focused sight, as well as obscuring the identity of the individual. Many female healers in the past – both medicine woman and midwives – were brutally persecuted by religion, some even burnt as witches… Mazzoni’s work captures their deep connection with nature and their innate power and femininity with delicacy and beautiful detail.

A body of a victim lies trapped in the debris after an earthquake hit, in Kathmandu, Nepal April 25, 2015. Rescue efforts in Nepal are intensifying after nearly 2,000 people were killed on Saturday in the worst earthquake there in more than 80 years. Many countries and charities have offered aid to deal with the disaster. Seventeen people have been killed on Mount Everest by avalanches – the mountain's worst-ever disaster. Meanwhile a powerful aftershock was felt on Sunday in Nepal, India and Bangladesh, and more avalanches were reported near Everest. (Photo by Navesh Chitrakar/Reuters)

A Taliban helicopter takes off after bringing aid to the site of an earthquake in Gayan, Afghanistan on June 23, 2022. A powerful earthquake struck a rugged, mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan early Wednesday, killing at least 1,000 people and injuring 1,500 more in one of the country's deadliest quakes in decades, the state-run news agency reported. (Photo by Ali Khara/Reuters)

Emergency workers save a shepherd dog from a beach during a forest fire on August 2, 2021 in Mugla, a Marmaris' district, as Turkey struggles against its deadliest wildfires in decades. A roaring blaze raced toward a Turkish thermal power plant and farmers herded panicked cattle toward the sea as wildfires that have killed eight people raged on for a seventh day. The nation of 84 million has been transfixed in horror as the most destructive wildfires in generations erase pristine forests and rich farmland across swaths of Turkey's Mediterranean and Aegean coasts. (Photo by AFP Photo/Stringer)

A woman mourns the loss of her husband, next to a placard which reads “I'm a pusher”, who was shot dead by an unidentified gunman in Manila on July 23, 2016. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte swept to power in May on a promise to clampdown on drugs, and police have since confirmed killing nearly 200 people in a two-month crime blitz. There has also been a surge in killings by anti-drug vigilantes who leave victims' corpses on city streets wrapped in packaging tape with signs accusing them of being drug dealers. (Photo by Noel Celis/AFP Photo)

In this February 27, 1984, file photo, singer Placido Domingo laughs with members of the Rockettes at New York's Radio City Music Hall. The singer and dancers met while rehearsing for Channel Thirteen's “Gala of Stars 1984”. Nine women in the opera world have told The Associated Press that they were sexually harassed by Domingo, one of the most celebrated and powerful men in opera. The women say the encounters took place over three decades, at venues that included opera companies where he held top managerial positions. (Photo by Steve Friedman/AP Photo/File)

Soma-Nomaoi is a festival that recreates a battle scene from more than 1,000 years ago. It is annually held for 4 days from July 22 to 25 in Haramachi City, Fukushima Prefecture, in the eastern part of Japan. In this historical event, 600 mounted samurai in traditional Japanese armor, with long swords at their side and ancestral flagstaffs streaming from their backs, ride across open fields. Soma-Nomaoi has been designated an Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property.

Photo: A young woman (C) clad in samurai costume leads other local poeple as she rides her horse during a parade at the annual Soma Nomaoi festival in Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture, on July 28, 2012. The traditional full-scale festival kicked off for the first time after the accident of the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant following the massive earthquake and the tsunami on March 11, 2011. (Photo by Toru Yamanaka/AFP Photo)