Sir Nils Olav, colonel-in-chief of the Norwegian Army's King's Guard, inspects his troops in 2008. Olav was inducted into the army in 1972 with the rank of lance corporal, and has received a series of promotions since then as well as a knighthood. As of 2019 he holds the rank of brigadier. The name Nils Olav, and its associated ranks, have been used by three king penguins over the years, all resident at Edinburgh Zoo. The animal pictured is the second. His military insignia is attached to his flipper.

Photograph: Mark Owens

Eugen Sandow (2 April 1867 – 14 October 1925) was a German bodybuilder and showman. Born in Königsberg, Sandow became interested in bodybuilding at the age of ten during a visit to Italy. He studied under strongman Ludwig Durlacher in the late 1880s and, on Durlacher's recommendation, performed in a series of matches against leading figures in the sport such as Charles Sampson and Henry McCann. In 1901 he organised what is believed to be the world's first major body building competition. Set in London's Royal Albert Hall, Sandow judged the event alongside author Arthur Conan Doyle and athlete/sculptor Charles Lawes-Wittewronge.

This picture shows an 1894 poster advertising the Sandow Trocadero Vaudevilles, a show featuring Sandow and produced by Florenz Ziegfeld Jr..

Poster: Strobridge Lithographic Company; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

An oil platform in Mittelplate, the largest oil field in Germany. The field is located in the North Sea, around 7 km (4.3 mi) from the shore, in the tidal flats of the Schleswig-Holstein Wadden Sea National Park. It was discovered in 1980 and 1981 when test borings in the Mittelplate vicinity found oil in several sandstone layers. Due to the location of the field in an ecologically sensitive area it was subjected to hydrographic, hydrodynamic and meteorological studies to model storm, wave, and ice-flow conditions. The results led to the construction of an artificial island in 1985, which holds a drilling and production facility. By the 20th anniversary of the start of production, 20 million tonnes of crude had been produced from the field.

Photograph: Ralf Roletschek

Madonna and Child with Angels is the central panel of the large multi-paneled altarpiece produced by Masaccio for the chapel of Saint Julian in the church of Santa Maria del Carmine in Pisa, Italy. The panel, which is badly damaged and smaller than its original size, was produced in collaboration with Masaccio's brother Giovanni and with Andrea di Giusto in 1426. It depicts six figures: the Madonna, Child, and four angels. The Madonna is the centre figure and is larger than any of the others to signify her importance. Christ sits on her knees, eating grapes offered to him by his mother. The grapes represent the wine which was drunk at the Last Supper, symbolising Christ's blood. Madonna and Child with Angels is now in the collection of the National Gallery in London.

Paiting: Masaccio

Elk Bath is a wildlife photograph by John McColgan, a fire behavior expert working for the Alaska Fire Service division of the US Bureau of Land Management. It was taken on August 6, 2000, on the East Fork of the Bitterroot River on the Sula complex in the state of Montana. The picture shows two elk seeking protection from a raging wildfire by standing in the river. It was one of the Time magazine Photos of the Year 2000. McColgan took the picture with a Kodak DC280 digital camera.

Photograph: John McColgan

Sha-có-pay is an oil-on-canvas painting from life by American artist George Catlin. It depicts an indigenous American named Sha-có-pay (which means "The Six" in the Dakota language), who was chief of the Plains Ojibwe. Catlin traveled throughout Western North America, painting indigenous peoples at a time when the only contact with Europeans was from explorers and traders. The painting shows traditional Plains Ojibwe clothing such as a beaded buckskin shirt, a buffalo-hide robe, eagle feathers, hair pipes, and a beaded necklace that is found only among the tribes of the northernmost plains, the Ojibwe and the Cree. The portrait was painted by the artist during a trip to Fort Union in 1832. It now resides in the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.

Painting: George Catlin

Billie Holiday, real name Eleanora Fagan (April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959), was an American jazz and pop singer whose career spanned nearly thirty years. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner Lester Young, Holiday was known for her vocal delivery and improvisational skills, which made up for her limited range and lack of formal music education.

Photograph: William P. Gottlieb, restoration: Kaldari

Rootabaga Stories is a children's book of interrelated short stories by Carl Sandburg, written in 1922. The stories are whimsical and sometimes melancholy, making use of nonsense language. Rootabaga Stories was originally created for Sandburg's own daughters, Margaret, Janet and Helga—whom he nicknamed "Spink", "Skabootch", and "Swipes"—and those nicknames occur in some of the Rootabaga stories. The book was born of Sandburg's desire for fairy tales to which American children could relate, rather than the traditional European stories involving royalty and knights. He therefore set the book in a fictionalized American Midwest called the "Rootabaga country", in which fairy-tale concepts were mixed with trains, sidewalks, and skyscrapers.

This picture shows the frontispiece of the 1922 edition of the book.

Illustration: Maud and Miska Petersham; restoration: Adam Cuerden

Oath of the Horatii is a large painting by the French artist Jacques-Louis David painted in 1784. It depicts a scene from a Roman legend about a seventh-century BC dispute between two warring cities, Rome and Alba Longa. Instead of the two cities sending their armies to war, they agree to choose three men from each city; the victor in that fight will be the victorious city. From Rome, three brothers from a Roman family, the Horatii, agree to end the war by fighting three brothers from a family of Alba Longa, the Curiatii. The three brothers, all of whom appear willing to sacrifice their lives for the good of Rome, are shown saluting their father, who holds their swords out for them. The principal sources for the story behind David's Oath are the first book of Livy, as elaborated by Dionysius of Halicarnassus. However, the moment depicted in David's painting is his own invention. The painting led to the popularization of the Roman salute and also increased David's fame, allowing him to take on his own students. It is now in the Louvre in Paris.

Painting: Jacques-Louis David

A promotional flyer for Supir Istimewa ("Special Chauffeur"), a 1954 black-and-white Indonesian film directed by Rempo Urip and produced by Djamaluddin Malik for the Persari Film Corporation. Starring MS Priyadi, Ermina Zaenah, Abdul Hadi, and Djauhari Effendi, the film follows a wealthy young man who passes as a chauffeur to convince a village woman to fall in love with him. The film was based on a screenplay by Saleh Iskandar Rais.

Artwork: Employee(s) of Persari Film Corporation; restored by Chris Woodrich

Self-Portrait with Two Pupils is a 1785 self-portrait painting by French artist Adélaïde Labille-Guiard. It depicts the artist with two of her pupils, Marie Gabrielle Capet and Marie-Marguerite Carreaux de Rosemond. Born in Paris on 11 April 1749, Labille-Guiard grew up in a neighbourhood of artists and, on her own initiative, began painting and receiving training from them. She began to take students of her own in 1780. They were all female and she was an advocate for women's involvement in painting. Labille-Guiard spent considerable time planning Self-Portrait with Two Pupils—she produced a chalk study during this period in which she was investigating the closeness and the effect of the light on the students' heads. The finished painting is almost life-size and it has been speculated that the artist and one of the pupils are looking at a mirror. In this case Labille-Guiard is actually painting the very painting the observer sees. The painting is now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Painting: Adélaïde Labille-Guiard