Female Competitors pose onstage during the annual Mr. Korea competition on July 7, 2004 in Seoul South Korea. Mr. Korea, organized by the National Body Builder's Association, is one of the biggest bodybuilding competitions in Asia. (Photo by Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)
A young YPJ recruit (in pink) arrives to the training base for her first day in training near Derek City, Syria. The YPJ schedule is demanding and requires discipline – new soldiers in training get about 6 hours of sleep a night and wake up at 4 AM to begin exercising; afterwards, their day consists of a full schedule of drills and classroom lessons. Before joining the YPJ many of the girls had never participated in physical activity or sports before. (Photo by Erin Trieb/NBC News)
The painted nails of a Kurdish Peshmerga female fighter are seen as she takes up a position during combat skills training before being deployed to fight Islamic State militants, at their military camp in Sulaimaniya, northern Iraq September 18, 2014. (Photo by Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters)
FaceResearch.org, a site run by two psychologists at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, features software that can average together faces from thousands of photos. These images purportedly show the average face of women from 40 different nationalities.
Child beauty pageants are a billion-dollar industry in the U.S. While some critics see the pageants as an exploitation of innocents, others—particularly pageant parents—view the competitions as a way for a young talent to enter the entertainment industry. Shows such as Toddler & Tiaras have examined the behind-the-scenes drama of these tightly orchestrated contests, but now a show of Susan Anderson’s photographs at L.A.’s Kopeikin Gallery (through December 24), puts the glamour and excess of child beauty pageants on a pedestal for our contemplation.
A participant jumps during the Red Bull Jump and Freeze competition at the ski resort of Gudauri, Georgia, March 20, 2016. (Photo by David Mdzinarishvili/Reuters)