Will it ever end? PICTURE THAT!

Nature Unveiling Herself Before Science
(La Nature se dévoilant à la Science)
is an
allegorical sculpture created in 1899 in the Art Nouveau style by Louis-Ernest Barrias.
The sculpture depicts a woman—
personifying Nature—
removing a veil to reveal her face and bare breasts.
The sculpture, which is in the Musée d'Orsay, was commissioned for the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers.
Underneath the veil, Nature wears a gown held up by a scarab.
The figure is made of marble, with the gown made of Algerian onyx, and the scarab of malachite.
The sculpture has also been reproduced in other media.
According to historians of science
Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison,
the sculpture
"blends the ancient trope of the veil of Isis, interpreted as nature's desire to hide her secrets, with the modern fantasy
of
(female) nature
willingly revealing herself to the
(male) scientist,
without violence or artifice."
According to historian of science Carolyn Merchant, the sculpture is emblematic of transformation of conceptions of nature that came with the Scientific Revolution:
"From an active teacher and parent,
she [Nature] has become a mindless, submissive body."
In a similar vein, biologist and essayist Gerald Weissmann has noted the similarity between Nature's pose in Barrias' sculpture and that of the central figure in the 1876 painting Dr. Pinel Unchaining the Mad by Tony Robert-Fleury, a released inmate from an insane asylum who has
"the detached look of the very lost."
Literary critic Elaine Showalter imagines a companion piece depicting Science would consist of
"a fully clothed man, whose gaze [is] bold, direct, and keen, the penetrating gaze of intellectual and sexual mastery".
Brandenburg Gate
The Brandenburg Gate (German: Brandenburger Tor)
is a
former city gate and one of the main symbols of Berlin and Germany.
It is located west of the city center at the junction of Unter den Linden and Ebertstraße, immediately west of the Pariser Platz.
It is the only remaining gate of a series through which one formerly entered Berlin.
One block to the north stands the Reichstag building.
The gate is the monumental entry to Unter den Linden, the renowned boulevard of linden trees which formerly led directly to the city palace of the Prussian monarchs.
It was commissioned by
King Frederick William II of Prussia
as a
sign of peace
and
built by
Carl Gotthard Langhans
from
1788 to 1791.
The Brandenburg Gate was restored from 2000 to 2002 by the
Stiftung Denkmalschutz Berlin
(Berlin Monument Conservation Foundation).
Today,
it is
considered one of Europe's most famous landmarks.
The Brandenburg Gate was not part of the old fortifications but one of 18 gates within the fiscal excise wall (German: Akzisemauer),
erected in the 1730s, including the old fortified city and many of its then suburbs.
Between 1788 and 1791 the prior simple guard houses siding the gate were replaced by the current construction.
The Gate consists of twelve Doric columns, six to each side, forming five passageways. Citizens originally were allowed to use only the outermost two.
Atop the gate is the Quadriga, a chariot drawn by four horses driven by Victoria,
the Roman goddess of victory.