Venus Verticordia

Venus Verticordia is one of the most puzzling works by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, a Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood painter who was also a poet and often paired his pictures with sonnets of his own. The goddess appears almost nude, with auburn hair and a golden halo around her head, surrounded by roses and honeysuckle in a dark, lush garden. Her Latin name refers to her role as the changer of hearts, able to turn women towards virtue and chastity. Yet the painting seems to suggest the opposite: the Venus of carnal love is shown with the attributes of a saint, and the tension between the sacred and the sensual is at the heart of the work.

The symbolism is dense. The apple she holds may recall the Apple of Discord that set off the Trojan War, or the forbidden fruit of Eden, and in both cases it points to desire and temptation. The roses and honeysuckle, flowers that Victorian viewers read as a coded language, carried sensual meanings, and Cupid's arrow, aimed at the goddess's own breast, hints at desire beyond control. The yellow butterflies that circle the halo and settle on her hands may refer to the soul, to her attendants, or to the soul's involvement in love as much as the body's. It was also Rossetti's first major oil painting of a nude, which helps explain the controversy it provoked.

Rossetti began the picture around 1864 using a young cook he had seen in the street. Later, after meeting Alexa Wilding, he replaced the original face with hers, which probably accounts for why the features never quite sit in harmony with the rest of the figure. The work also drew criticism from John Ruskin, his former patron, and the strain it caused marked the start of a rapid decline in their relationship. Algernon Charles Swinburne, by contrast, praised the painting of leaves, flowers and fruit with enthusiasm. Today the picture is held at the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum, and its interest lies in showing how Rossetti pushed Pre-Raphaelite symbolism towards openly provocative sensuality.

Painter

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Date

1866

Medium

oil paint, canvas

Dimensions

81 × 68 cm

Museum

Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum, Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole

Movement

Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood

Genre

mythological painting

Depicts

Verticordia, Venus

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