Further to...

the previous post & its references to the Venuses of art history comes this article in the Guardian based upon a new book reappraising the life (as an artist in her own right) of Victorine Meurent, who modelled frequently for Manet & not least for both 'Dejeuner sur l'Herbe' & 'Olympia', those icons of modern art & painting which subverted the academic tradition of the female nude & so shocked in their time with their uncompromising directness: note, for instance, how 'Olympia' confronts the spectator with both her unwavering gaze & the unpretentious starkness of the fact of her physical reality, her naked modern womanliness, rather than being merely the passive site & recipient of the viewer's gaze or the coy creature of tradition.