Venus & Cupid

Venus & Cupid; based on the classical marriage poems (or epithalamia) and was almost certainly painted to celebrate a wedding (the Venus may be a portrait of the bride). Lotto was fascinated with emblematic devices. The shell above Venus' head and the rose petals on her lap are conventional attributes of the goddess. The ivy is symbolic of conjugal fidelity while the myrtle wreath and brazier suspended from it are accouterments of the marriage chamber. Venus wears the earring and diadem of a sixteenth-century bride. Cupid's action, an augury of fertility, confers a mood of lighthearted wit on this most popular Venetian subject. - There is a border around the image. Image size is correct. Many sizes available.