Venus and Mars ~ Sandro Botticelli
1483; oil on canvas; 69 x 173.5 cm;
National Gallery, London, England

Venus and Mars
~ Sandro Botticelli

Born Florence, Italy c.1445;
died Florence, Italy 1510

Botticelli initially trained as a goldsmith and then probably became a pupil of Filippo Lippi. When he was aged about 30 he began to enjoy the patronage of the Medici family, for whom he painted his best-known mythological works, Primava and the Birth of Venus. In Venus and Mars, Botticelli playfully portrays Mars, the God of War, utterly vanquished by Venus, the Goddess of Love and Beauty. At the time of painting there was much ribald entertainment in poetry about man's exhaustion after sexual activity. The canvas could have formed the back of a chest or bench that was put in the bedroom on the occasion of a wedding - this may account for its unusual shape. Botticelli paints his subjects with marble-like skin and harsh lines, which correspond with the Florentine obsession with sculpture, but he softens this with curly hair and delicate material. He combines archaic figures with contemporary artefacts - modern armour and costume - and alludes to his patrons, the Vespucci family, with the wasps (Vespe in Italian) buzzing around Mars' head.

Taken from the A - Z of Art