All Photos © Carsten Peter/National Geographic. Above: The lava at Nyiragongo is made of an alkali-rich volcanic rock; its unusual composition may be a factor in the lava’s fluidity.

Photographer Carsten Peter descended into the fiery center of Nyiragongo—an active volcano towering over a city of one million people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo—for the April issue of National Geographic magazine.  See Carsten and his team explore the depths of Nyiragongo in Man vs. Volcano on the National Geographic channel. To see more of Carsten Peter’s work click here.

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All photos © Ken Shung.

New York based photographer Ken Shung says he set out to make images that embody the idea of the “Pretty Picture.” He captures disjunction, viewing social spaces in search of a magical decisive moment that shows something ominous, paradoxical, or timeless. “In this collection of images, I ask the question of when is a photograph just a pretty picture?” he says. The work is on exhibit at the New York Public Library at  331 E. 10th street New York City until tomorrow. To see more of Shung’s work click here.
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© Larry Louie

Fog enshrouds the abandoned Tripureshwar Mahadev Mandir Temple, a cultural heritage site in Nepal. It was built as a traditional Newari temple by Queen Lalita Tripura Sundari in 1818. Located in Kathmandu, there has been talk of restoring this veiled temple. Larry Louie‘s image is included in the World in Focus 2011 online gallery.

All Photos © Deborah Luster.

With a homicide rate nearly eight times the national average, New Orleans stands today, as it did as far back as the 1850s, as the homicide capital of the United States. Today it is the third most deadly city on the globe. Tooth For An Eye: A Chorography of Violence in Orleans Parish is a series of tondo photographs documenting contemporary and historical homicide sites in New Orleans. This collection of images was recently published by Twin Palms. Too see more of Luster’s work click here.

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© Mark Rubenstein

SCAD alum and former PDN staffer, Mark Rubenstein, migrated from New York to L.A. in 2009, continuing his series of fine-art photography based on post-adolescent adults. Most recently, his work has gained buzz through art blogs and Marc Jacobs’ Bookmarc (where he collaborated on a post card series).  “Each image is unsettling and that’s exactly what I want,” Rubenstein says. “I draw heavily on nostalgia and movies from when I was growing up. Katsuhiro Otomo and Terrence Malick are my biggest influences.” Rubenstein takes his time, only releasing a few images per year when he feels inspired, but his latest work “The Shape of Things to Come,” shows increasing maturity. See more of his work here. – Jessica Gordon