Every landscape in Benedek Lampert’s new series is built from the materials destroying it. Fishing nets become oceans, plastic bags become Arctic ice.
Hungarian photographer Benedek Lampert is famous for creating realistic-looking photos made of Lego bricks, challenging viewers to tell whether they’re looking at a real place or a carefully constructed scene. His Lego Eiffel Tower could have been part of the Paris skyline, and his models of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship Endurance and a meticulously detailed Formula 1 racetrack followed suit.
The photos in Lampert’s newest project, ‘The Nature We Replaced,’ don’t use Lego bricks at all. And they’re not meant to look real. In fact, they’re meant to look exactly like what they are: garbage.
The Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the global average. As sea ice disappears, polar bears lose the frozen platforms they depend on for hunting seals, traveling and raising their cubs. Scientists project continued declines in polar bear populations if greenhouse gas emissions remain high. The Arctic in this image is built entirely from plastic bags – a symbol of a world gradually replacing nature with waste.
“Nature, wildlife and environmental storytelling have always been close to me, and I couldn’t think of a more universal issue than the future of the planet we all share,” he says.
The project consists of eight conceptual miniature photographs, each exploring the relationship between humans and the natural world. Instead of simply documenting environmental problems, Lampert set out to visualize the tension between wildlife and the world humans have built around it.
Illegal wildlife trafficking continues to threaten elephants and rhinoceroses across Africa. Thousands have been killed for ivory and horn, driven by international demand and organized poaching networks. The landscape is built from spent bullet casings, reducing an entire ecosystem to the evidence left behind after a hunt.
“Instead of recreating nature, I rebuilt each habitat entirely from the materials that threaten it. Plastic bags become Arctic ice. Fishing nets become oceans. Wood products become forest. Plastic straws become bamboo. Every landscape is constructed from everyday human waste or objects associated with the destruction of that ecosystem,” he explains.
Go behind the scenes to see how Benedek Lampert created the scenes for his ‘The Nature We Replaced’ photo project.
Lampert tells DPReview that the whole idea started with a penguin.
“I recreated a viral penguin story using a miniature figure… and that project made me realize I wanted to do something bigger with wildlife photography. But the more I thought about it, the more I wanted the series to be about something beyond the visuals. That’s when the idea of building each habitat from the very materials that threaten it was born.”
Wildfires, deforestation and habitat fragmentation continue to reduce the forests that many tiger populations depend on. While some fires occur naturally, many are directly linked to human land clearing and agricultural expansion. Burnt charcoal and used matches replace the forest floor, illustrating an ecosystem consumed by fire.
He isn’t chasing real-world accuracy. “It’s not meant to show reality exactly as it is,” he tells us, “but to exaggerate it just enough to make people stop and think about what’s happening to these habitats and species.”
Lampert partnered with German company Schleich to provide the animal figurines. “I chose Schleich because of the exceptional quality and realism of their figures. That level of detail was essential – using less realistic models would have taken away from the emotional impact and credibility of the photographs.”
Lampert’s attention to detail extends all the way to the image titles. Each ends with a period: a marker, he says, for the irreversible damage already done. He’s careful to add that hope is not lost, noting that conservation efforts have succeeded. “The period marks what cannot be undone, but not what can still be saved.”
More photos from this series
Hundreds of thousands of sea turtles are accidentally caught in fishing gear every year. Abandoned “ghost nets” continue trapping marine animals for decades, even after being lost or discarded. In this image, the ocean itself is made from fishing net, turning the turtles’ natural habitat into an inescapable trap.
Over the past decades, vast areas of Southeast Asian rainforest have been cleared for timber, palm oil plantations and agriculture. Habitat loss remains the greatest threat to wild orangutans. The jungle is reconstructed from industrial machine parts, reflecting how ancient forests are increasingly exchanged for economic profit.
Antarctica is changing rapidly. Rising temperatures, shrinking sea ice and increasing human influence threaten one of Earth’s last great wildernesses. Sea ice is essential for many penguin species, supporting feeding, breeding and the marine food web. The frozen landscape is constructed from Styrofoam, plastic packaging and discarded plastic bags, suggesting a future where even the most remote wilderness is remembered only through the waste we leave behind.
Across Africa, roads, fences, agriculture and expanding human settlements increasingly block ancient wildlife migration routes. Buffalo, elephants, zebras, wildebeest and many other species depend on seasonal movement between feeding grounds and water sources. The interrupted path represents landscapes that no longer allow wildlife to move freely.
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