Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island, with Manhattan Island in the background, New York, United States (40°41? N ? 74°03? W).If one thing were to be chosen to symbolise the United States, it would be Liberty, holding up its light to the world. More commonly known as the Statue of Liberty, it was a gift from the people of France. The statue was created by French sculptor Auguste Bartholdi, who, after having completed the project, managed to convince the French authorities to offer it as a gift to the United States to celebrate the alliance between the two nations. This female colossus holds up the flame of liberty and a tablet with the date of the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America. Broken chains lie at her feet.

**The artist: Yann Arthus-Bertrand**

Born in 1946 in Paris, Yann Arthus-Bertrand began a career in cinema as an assistant producer and as an actor. However, his passion for the animal world soon lead him first to become the director of a nature reserve in France and then to the Maasai Mara in Kenya, where he worked on his thesis, at the same time training as a hot-air balloon pilot. As a press report photographer, he has worked with magazines such as National Geographic, Géo, Life, Paris Match, and Figaro Magazine. In 1990, he completed his first documentary work combining photography and video in a project called Good Breeding. One year later, the artist and his team founded the photographic agency ?Altitude?. In 1992, Yann Arthus-Bertrand decided to begin a huge photographic project that would cover the state of the world and its inhabitants ? ?The Earth from Above?. Published in 1999, the associated book was an international success, selling over 4 million copies. In 2006, he enters in the Académie des Beaux-arts [French Academy of Fine Arts]. Since then, he has produced a number of projects aimed at increasing awareness of ecological and environmental issues, such as the well-known films Home (2009) and Planet Ocean (2012). His highly anticipated latest film Human is due to be released in September 2015.