Ingenial

100 years ago, Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin, a well known artist and illustrator of Russian Folk tales, traveled to northern Russia to collect folk art. He came across the wooden churches of Russia and fell in love with them, photographing them and bringing back to Moscow the sad news of their lamentable condition. Through his efforts and the sales of postcards like the one below, money was raised to restore the 300-year old churches.

100 years later, Richard Davies retraced Bilibin’s steps in northern Russia and photographed the now 400-year old churches, in their stunning condition considering their age. His photos will be exhibited in Finland and UK.

View the rest at RichardDavies.co.uk

You might call it an act of God. A severe drought in Venezuela has exposed a church—pictured in 2008 (left) and on February 21, 2010—that had been inundated when a hydroelectric dam was built in 1985.

The 82-foot-tall (25-meter-tall) church and the Andean town of Potosi (see map) were flooded to establish the Uribante-Caparo water reservoir to power the plant, which is currently operating at just 7 percent of its capacity, according to the Reuters service. (Get news on the global water crisis.)

The church is now an ominous symbol of energy shortages in the country, which gets around 68 percent of its power from hydroelectricity, Reuters reported. The droughts spurred Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to declare an energy emergency in February.

National Geographic.