Focus on this artwork and discuss the Description.
The nude figure of a woman reclines on a bed, partly covered by a bright blue mantle, with a small basket of flowers at her left elbow. Two women enter the scene from behind a curtain, one of whom appears to be weeping. The extreme pallor of her skin and the small snake moving away on the sheet signify the final moments of Cleopatra's life. Her head has dropped back on the pillows, causing her crown to fall from her wavy golden hair. While Cleopatra was a relatively common subject for her contemporaries, it was rare to portray this moment of the story, the queen's death.