The World Through a Lens

Compelled by stories he’d heard as a child, the photographer Showkat Nanda traveled to the high Himalayas to see Gurez, a valley long off-limits to most travelers.

Burned out from life in New York, a photographer traveled to northern Chile to study the ancient wisdom of the Lickanantay, the area’s Indigenous people. Here’s what she saw.

Held in a small, mountainous village, this festival has it all: snakes, charmers, religion, science. See for yourself — and try not to squirm.

The annual spectacle, featuring fanciful caravans and riders on horseback, is arguably the most potent visual representation of Andalusian culture.

Documenting video game parlors offered a French photographer a way to explore Los Angeles and its surrounding areas.

Generations of Mainers have made a living working seasonal, nature-based jobs. Harvesting the balsam used to make wreaths is one of them.

A photographer in Wisconsin set out to learn how wild turkeys attract their mates — and found that the answer involves wingmen and sexy snoods.

A photographer embedded with the Sea Clown Sailing Circus on the troupe’s journeys through the Mediterranean. Here’s what he saw.

Catch a glimpse of a storied tradition in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where, for hundreds of years, divers have leaped from a bridge in the southern city of Mostar.

Excavations in the Peloponnesian village of Iklaina are yielding rich insights into the lives of the Mycenaean civilization’s general population.

Injured birds of prey have a fighting chance to recover thanks to the volunteers at Owl Moon Raptor Center in Boyds, Md.

Twenty years ago, a grass court emerged from the surrounding cornfields in Charles City. Its story is colored by exacting standards, profound loss and, ultimately, rebirth.

A Times journalist spent three months capturing a contemporary portrait of Hungary’s capital, where he lived for several years as a child in the early ’90s.

A photographer in Maine has been documenting groups of women who submerge themselves in near-freezing water. Here’s what she’s seen.

A photographer traveled across America on one of Amtrak’s long-distance train routes. Here’s what she saw.

The Antico Setificio Fiorentino, which relies on looms from the 18th and 19th centuries, has been producing precious textiles since 1786.

A downpour, a dust storm and an encounter with a lively dig team offered a photographer a new perspective on the country’s celebrated tombs.

For seven years, a photographer based in Delhi has collected images of ornamental structures known as chabutras. Here are some of his favorites.

A photographer spent a few weeks helping run a horseback riding program on the white-sand beaches of Benguerra Island. Here’s what she saw.

The state’s oldest continually open general store serves customers in Fishtail from all walks of life, from ranchers and miners to doctors and C.E.O.s.

Lionfish, while spectacularly beautiful, are wreaking havoc on Caribbean reef habitats.

A Dutch photographer, documenting the culture of regional train travel, managed to get around the Italian island for less than $100. Here’s what she saw.

The identity of the Seri is integrally tied to their natural environment, which in recent years has been susceptible to an increasing number of existential threats.

In December, a photographer set off on a 2,600-mile road trip, traveling from the Yemeni border to the Strait of Hormuz. Here’s what she saw.

A train enthusiast reflects on the grandeur of the world’s largest operating steam locomotive, recently returned to service.

As is true throughout rural Japan, many of the once-vibrant villages on Honshu’s Kii Peninsula are aging into nothingness.

A series of ecological initiatives, including the eradication of several invasive species, has dramatically revived the life and landscape of this remote sub-Antarctic island.

The world’s densest collection of freshwater springs is at the center of a slow-motion environmental tragedy.

Each spring and autumn, the skies in southern Denmark come to life with the swirling displays of hundreds of thousands of starlings, an event known locally as “sort sol.”

Can the No Mow May movement help transform the traditional American lawn — a manicured carpet of grass — into something more ecologically beneficial?

A small town in Central Mexico is home to around 200 open-air carving workshops, from which an astonishing array of sculptures continuously emerges.

Scattered around town are do-it-yourself mining operations, abandoned film props and a cafe that serves both waffles and opals.

For a longtime aerial photographer, snowfall in the Green Mountain State offers a fresh palette of possibility.

Environmental initiatives in the Azuero Peninsula offer hope for the future of a critically endangered subspecies.

After a storm disrupted plans for a 99-mile paddling trek, a Times journalist’s time on the water took a more reflective turn. Come look and listen alongside him.

For centuries, Kharnak nomads have raised livestock in one of the most hauntingly beautiful — and inhospitable — places on earth. Can their traditions outlast a generational exodus?

For 10 days, a photojournalist drove across Jordan from north to south, visiting several of the country’s most treasured sites. Here’s what he saw.

The act of fishing in Los Angeles seems almost defiant: a tranquil outdoors activity against a backdrop of concrete, litter and highway overpasses.

A longstanding source of local pride and affection, Welsh mountain ponies have seen many of their traditional roles vanish. A new initiative aims to ensure their continued survival.

The stretch of coastline in southwest Africa is a strange and beautiful reminder that, in the end, we are powerless against nature and time.

Every year, thousands of celebrants gather at a temple complex in Nepal’s capital in honor of Shiva, one of Hinduism’s most revered gods.

Our weekly photo essay series offered readers a glimpse of distant places and cultures that, for a second straight year, remained largely inaccessible.

Deep in the Southern Cardamom Mountains, former loggers and poachers have assumed new roles as protective rangers and ecotourism guides. Can their efforts help preserve a vast stretch of wilderness?

For millenniums, farmers and vintners in northeastern Sicily have benefited from the area’s mineral-rich soil, a result of volcanic eruptions.

To visitors, the Norwegian archipelago can seem both ethereal and eternal. But climate change all but guarantees an eventual collapse of its vulnerable ecosystem.

Camel beauty contests take center stage at a celebration of Bedouin culture, held annually in the United Arab Emirates.

At a family farm in Shelby County, a group of 26 men from Nicaragua and Mexico perform the grueling seasonal work that Americans largely avoid.

The Rhodope Narrow-Gauge Railway serves remote communities in southwestern Bulgaria. Can longtime riders — and young enthusiasts — keep it running?

During the Hindu ceremony of Yadnya Kasada, the Tenggerese people toss offerings — food, money, flowers, livestock — into the hazy crater of Mount Bromo.

Between 2014 and 2020, Frank Herfort visited more than 770 metro stations in 19 cities, creating a remarkable archive of architectural and artistic splendor.

Wat Bang Phra, a temple in central Thailand, is renowned as a center for sak yant, a style of tattoo art believed by some to convey protective powers.

The San Pedro Community Gardens have provided physical and spiritual nourishment for the past half a century to multiple generations of immigrant Angelenos.

The 85-mile boat ride through rough seas left some of us huddling in discomfort. But the scenery on the remote and windswept islands was otherworldly.

Immerse yourself in the visual splendor of a tiny volcanic island in the northern Andaman Sea, the only home of the little-known Narcondam hornbill.

On the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in southern Mexico, a community of the local Zapotec people has long accepted — and celebrated — gender nonconformity.

Often overlooked, the communities in South and Southeast Asia complicate notions of Jewish identity while emphasizing its malleability.

A group of scientists and adventure athletes are venturing into icy labyrinths to study their relationships with glacial melting and climate change.

Thirty-three years after his first visit to the site, a photographer traveled to a remote jungle in search of a World War II plane that crashed there in 1944.

Last year, as the pandemic took hold, we launched a new visual series called The World Through a Lens. Here’s a look behind the scenes.

A three-day hike through the Teton Range in northwest Wyoming offers consistently stunning — and constantly unfolding — scenery.

Facing growing uncertainties, the Dukha people are being forced to make difficult decisions about their traditions and their future.

Southern Chile’s snow-capped mountains, vast plains and windswept lakes are often depicted in summertime. See the landscape dressed in autumnal hues.

Each year on Dec. 25, thousands of locals gather in the town of Santo Tomás — dressed in elaborate costumes — to dance, drink and duke it out.

On the island of Sumatra, a devoted group of conservationists is grasping for a solution that will benefit both the animals and the people who live around them.

For more than 10 years, a British photographer spent her summers at a dude ranch in northwest Wyoming. Here’s what she captured.

The dense metropolis is among the only places in India — and one of the few left in the world — where fleets of hand-pulled rickshaws still ply the streets.

An array of forces, including political suppression and the ubiquity of the internet, have made elements of traditional Tibetan lifestyles increasingly challenging.

Drug tourists, mining companies and farming encroachment are threatening the Wixárika people’s annual hunt for the psychedelic plant in the Mexican desert.

Held annually on the country’s Aegean coast, the Selcuk camel-wrestling festival is part of a nomadic legacy rooted in ancient Turkic tribes.

For a photographer based in Juneau, two Alaskan roads — the Glenn Highway and the Richardson Highway — formed the backbone of a stunning late-spring road trip.