Nara (奈良市, Nara-shi^?) is the capital city of Nara Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan. The city occupies the northern part of Nara Prefecture, directly bordering Kyoto Prefecture. Eight temples, shrines and ruins in Nara, specifically Tōdai-ji, Saidai-ji, Kōfuku-ji, Kasuga Shrine, Gangō-ji, Yakushi-ji, Tōshōdai-ji, and the Heijō Palace remains, together with Kasugayama Primeval Forest, collectively form "Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara", a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

According to the most complete extant historical record of ancient Japan Nihon Shoki the name "Nara" derived from the Japanese verb narasu "to flatten".

Nara was the capital of Japan from 710 to 784, lending its name to the Nara period.

The temples of Nara, known collectively as the Nanto Shichi Daiji, remained powerful even beyond the move of the political capital to Heian-kyō in 794, thus giving Nara a synonym of Nanto (南都, "The Southern Capital"^?).

In 2010, Nara celebrated the 1,300th anniversary of its ascension as Japan's imperial capital.

Yoshitomo Nara (奈良 美智, Nara Yoshitomo^?, born 5 December 1959 in Hirosaki, Japan) is a Japanese artist. He lives and works in Tokyo, though his artwork has been exhibited worldwide. Nara received his B.F.A. (1985) and an M.F.A. (1987) from the Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music. Between 1988 and 1993, Nara studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, in Germany. Nara has had nearly 40 solo exhibitions since 1984. He is represented in New York City by Marianne Boesky Gallery, in Los Angeles by Blum & Poe and in London by Stephen Friedman Gallery

Nara first came to the fore of the art world during Japan’s Pop art movement in the 1990s. The subject matter of his sculptures and paintings is deceptively simple: most works depict one seemingly innocuous subject (often pastel-hued children and animals drawn with confident, cartoonish lines) with little or no background. But these children, who appear at first to be cute and even vulnerable, sometimes brandish weapons like knives and saws. Their wide eyes often hold accusatory looks that could be sleepy-eyed irritation at being awoken from a nap—or that could be undiluted expressions of hate.

Kurumi Nara (Japanese: 奈良くるみ, born December 30, 1991 in Osaka, Japan) is a tennis player. She reached the third round of the 2008 US Open Girls singles tournament, where she lost to Kristina Mladenovic 2–6, 6–4, 7–6(4). She advanced to the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament for the first time at the 2010 French Open with a 4–6, 7–6(3), 10–8 win over Monica Niculescu. At four hours and 42 minutes, it was said to be the longest women's Grand Slam qualifier or main draw match in history. She would go on to lose her first round match to Arantxa Parra Santonja 6–2, 6–2. She also qualified for Wimbledon, and won her first Grand Slam main draw singles match with a 6–4, 6–2 win over Mariana Duque Marino

To help interpret the performance table, the legend below explains what each abbreviation and color coded box represents in the performance timeline.

To prevent confusion and double counting, information in this table is updated only once a tournament when the player's participation in the tournament has concluded.

Francisco Buarque de Hollanda (born June 19, 1944 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), popularly known as Chico Buarque (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈʃikʊ ˈbwaɾkɪ]), is a singer, guitarist, composer, dramatist, writer and poet. He is best known for his music, which often includes social, economic and cultural commentary on Brazil and Rio de Janeiro in particular.

Son of the academic Sérgio Buarque de Hollanda, Buarque lived in several locations throughout his childhood, though mostly in Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and Italy. He wrote and studied literature as a child and came to music through the bossa nova compositions of João Gilberto. He performed music throughout the 1960s as well as writing a play that was deemed dangerous by the Brazilian military dictatorship of the time. Buarque, along with several of his fellow musicians, were threatened by the government and eventually left Brazil in 1970. He moved to Italy again. However, he came back to Brazil in 1971, one year before the others, and continued to record albums, perform, and write, though much of his material was not allowed by government censors. He released several more albums in the 1980s and published three novels in the 1990s and 2000s, all of which were acclaimed critically.

Nara Lofego Leão (born January 19, 1942 in Vitória, Espírito Santo, Brazil; died June 7, 1989) was a Brazilian bossa nova and MPB (popular Brazilian music) singer and occasional actress. Her husband was Carlos Diegues, director and writer of Bye Bye Brasil.

When she was twelve, her father gave her a guitar since he was worried about her being shy. Popular musician and composer Patricio Teixeira and classical guitarist Solon Ayala were her teachers. While still a teenager, she met a number of singers and composers who took part of Bossa Nova's musical revolution, in late 1950s and early 1960s, including Roberto Menescal, Carlos Lyra, Ronaldo Bôscoli, João Gilberto, Vinicius de Moraes and Antônio Carlos Jobim. By 1963, after singing as an amateur for a few years, she became a professional and toured with Sérgio Mendes.

In the mid-1960s, the institution of military dictatorship in Brazil led her to sing increasingly political lyrics. Her show Opinião reflected her political beliefs and she had largely switched to political music by this point. In 1964, she even spoke against bossa nova as a movement, calling it "alienating". In 1968, she appeared on the album Tropicália: ou Panis et Circenses, performing "Lindonéia."