Mars and Venus (Botticelli)

Venus and Mars, c 1483. Tempera on panel, 69 cm x 173 cm

Mars and Venus is a c. 1483 painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli. It shows the Roman gods Venus and Mars in an allegory of beauty and valour. The youthful and voluptuous couple recline in a forest setting, surrounded by playful satyrs. The painting is typically held as an ideal of sensuous love, of pleasure and play.

In the painting Venus watches Mars sleep while two infant satyrs play, carrying his helmet and lance as another rests inside his breastplate under his arm. A fourth blows a small conch shell in his ear in an effort to wake him. Although the work draws from classical sources, perhaps in particular the description by Lucian of a lost painting of the marriage of Alexander the Great and Roxana, it diverges from these in important aspects, and is a product of early Renaissance Neoplatonist thinking. The scene is set in a haunted forest, and the sense of perspective and horizon extremely tight and compact. The sea from which Venus emerged can be seen in the distant background. In the foreground, a swarm of wasps hovers around Mars' head, possibly as a symbol that love is often accompanied by pain.^[1]

Another possible explanation is that the wasps represent the Vespucci family that may have commissioned the painting; the symbol of the Vespucci house is the wasp. The painting is thought originally to have been the back of a lettuccio, a wooden sofa, or a similar piece of furniture.^[2]

Source

The image may be based on the Stanze of Poliziano. Stanze 122 describes how the hero found Venus "seated on the edge of her couch, just then released from the embrace of Mars, who lay on his back in her lap, still feeding his eyes on her face". Poliziano was one of the humanist scholars in the court of Lorenzo de' Medici, and in his stanze he alludes to Giuliano di Piero de' Medici's prowess in a jousting tournament his older brother Lorenzo had organized to celebrate a treaty with Venice.

Giuliano di Piero de' Medici is most likely the athletic model for the war god who slumbers next to the goddess in this work. However, the description, with Mars in Venus' lap, gazing up at her, is a poor fit to the painting. Venus may have been Simonetta Vespucci, a great beauty of the time, married to the cousin of Amerigo Vespucci. Botticelli, who portrayed her many times after her death, asked to be buried, as she had been, in the Church of Ognissanti in Florence.

Provenance

Although today Botticelli is the most celebrated Florentine painter of second half of the 15th century, he was only rediscovered in the late 19th century when his emphasis on line and contour chimed with the contemporary sensibility. Between 1857 and 1878, the National Gallery, London, acquired five of his works, including Venus and Mars.^[1]

See also

• List of works by Sandro Botticelli

Notes

References

Botticelli Works Madonna and Child with an Angel Madonna and Child with an Angel Madonna della Loggia The Virgin and Child with Two Angels and the Young St. John the Baptist The Annunciation The Virgin and Child, St. John and an Angel Madonna and Child Adoration of the Magi Portrait of a Young Man Madonna in Glory with Seraphim Madonna of the Sea Madonna of the Rosegarden (Madonna del Roseto) Madonna and Child and Two Angels Portrait of Smeralda Brandini Fortitude Madonna and Child with Six Saints (Sant'Ambrogio Altarpiece) Virgin and Child with an Angel The Return of Judith to Bethulia The Discovery of the Murder of Holofernes Adoration of the Magi Portrait of a Young Woman Adoration of the Magi St. Sebastian Portrait of a Man with a Medal of Cosimo the Elder Portrait of Giuliano de' Medici Madonna and Child Catherine of Alexandria Nativity Portrait of Giuliano de' Medici The Birth of Christ Madonna and Child with Eight Angels St. Augustine Madonna of the Magnificat (Madonna del Magnificat) Madonna of the Book (Madonna del Libro) Portrait of a Young Woman Portrait of a Young Woman Annunciation St. Sixtus II Adoration of the Magi Primavera Pallas and the Centaur Venus and Mars Portrait of a Young Man Portrait of a Young Man The Story of Nastagio degli Onesti Venus and the Three Graces Presenting Gifts to a Young Woman A Young Man Being Introduced to the Seven Liberal Arts The Virgin and Child Enthroned (Bardi Altarpiece) The Birth of Venus Annunciation Madonna Adoring the Child with Five Angels Madonna of the Pomegranate (Madonna della Melagrana) The Virgin and Child with Four Angels and Six Saints (Pala di San Barnaba) Vision of St. Augustine Christ in the Sepulchre Salome with the Head of St. John the Baptist Extraction of St. Ignatius' Heart Cestello Annunciation The Virgin Adoring the Child Lamentation over the Dead Christ Portrait of a Man San Marco Altarpiece St. Augustine in His Cell Madonna and Child and the Young St John the Baptist Portrait of Lorenzo di Ser Piero Lorenzi Virgin and Child with the Infant St. John the Baptist Holy Trinity (Pala delle Convertite) The Virgin and Child with Three Angels (Madonna del Padiglione) Calumny of Apelles Lamentation over the Dead Christ with Saints Last Communion of St. Jerome Portrait of Dante The Story of Virginia The Story of Lucretia Crucifixion Christ Crowned with Thorns Transfiguration, St Jerome, St Augustine Judith Leaving the Tent of Holofernes Agony in the Garden The Mystical Nativity Baptism of St. Zenobius and His Appointment as Bishop Three Miracles of St. Zenobius Three Miracles of St. Zenobius Last Miracle and the Death of St. Zenobius