The Birth of Venus (Sandro Botticelli) : Uffizi Gallery : Art Project, powered by Google

The Birth of Venus

La nascita di Venere

1483-1485

Sandro Botticelli, 1445-1510

Tempera on panel
Height : 172.50 cm
Width : 278.50 cm

Located in: Botticelli

Viewing Notes

The painting was commissioned by Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’Medici, a cousin of Lorenzo the Magnificent. The theme was probably suggested by the humanist Poliziano. It depicts Venus born from the sea foam, blown by the west wind, Zephyr, and the nymph, Chloris, towards one of the Horai, who prepares to dress her with a flowered mantle.

This universal icon of Western painting was probably painted around 1484 for the villa of Castello owned by Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de 'Medici. Giorgio Vasari saw the work there in the mid-sixteenth century – along with Botticelli’s other well-known Primavera – and described it precisely as "showing the Birth of Venus." The old idea that the two Botticelli masterpieces were created for the same occasion, in spite of their substantial technical and stylistic diversity, is no longer accepted. However, rather than a birth, what we see is the goddess landing on the shore of her homeland, the island of Cyprus, or on Kithera. The theme, which can be traced back to Homer and to Ovid’s Metamophoses, was also celebrated by the great humanist Agnolo Poliziano in the poetic verses of his Stanze. The Venus of the Uffizi is of the “Venus pudica” type, whose right breast is covered by her right hand and billowing long blond hair partially shrouds her body. The goddess stands upright on a shell as she is driven towards the shore by the breeze of Zephyrus, a wind god, who is holding the nymph, Chloris. On the right is the Hora of springtime, who waits to greet Venus ashore with a cloak covered in pink flowers.

The seascape, stunning for its metaphysical tone and almost unreal quality, is illuminated by a very soft, delicate light. Like Botticelli’s other masterpiece, Pallas and the Centaur, the Birth of Venus is painted on canvas - fairly unusual for its time - using a technique of thin tempera, based on the use of diluted egg yolk, which lends itself particularly well to give the painting that aspect of extraordinary transparency, which brings to mind the pictorial quality of a fresco. The figure recalls classical sculpture and is very similar to the famous Medici Venus found in the Uffizi, which the artist certainly knew. The real meaning of this dreamlike vision is still under scholarly debate and investigation but is undoubtedly linked with the Neo-Platonic philosophy, widely cultivated in the Medici court.

Like the Primavera, the Birth of Venus is also associated with the concept of Humanitas,or virtuous Humanity, a theory developed by Marsilio Ficino in a letter to the young Lorenzo. According to the interpretation by Ernst Gombrich, the work depicts the symbolic fusion of Spirit and Matter, the harmonious interaction of Idea and Nature. Nevertheless, the interpretations of this painting of extraordinary visual impact are numerous and diverse. The divine ethereal figure has been viewed as an allegorical representation of Humanitas upon her arrival to Florence, while the nymph holding out the cloak of flowers for the goddess may perhaps be identified as Flora, the same depicted in this masterpiece’s “twin”, the Primavera, where she may be seen instead as the personification of the city of Florence. From this work emerges clear evidence of Botticell’s strive to reach perfection of form that could rival with classical antiquity. It is for this reason that the humanist Ugolino Verino in his work Epigrammata, presented in 1485 to the King of Hungary, Matthias Corvinus, likened the Florentine painter to the legendary Apelles of Ancient Greece.

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Artwork History

Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici family collections

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Artist Information

Sandro Botticelli (Alessandro Filipepi)

Born
Florence, Italy
Died
Florence, Italy

Active Period: 1445-1510

Alessandro, whose nickname probably derives from that of his brother Giovanni, who was known as "Battigello" (gold-beater), began work as a goldsmith. At the age of almost twenty, he entered the workshop of Filippo Lippi, whose style had a crucial influence on his earliest paintings (the Madonna and Child in the Ospedale degli Innocenti in Florence and the Madonna and Child with an Angel in the Musée Fesch in Ajaccio). In 1467 Sandro became an apprentice in the workshop of Verrocchio (the Madonna and Child in the Musée du Louvre, Paris and the Madonna and Child with Angels in the Museo di Capodimonte, Naples). His first documented work was Fortitude (Uffizi Gallery, Florence), painted in 1470 to complete the series of allegorical images commissioned from the Pollaiuolo brothers' workshop by the Tribunale della Mercanzia. In 1472 Botticelli enrolled in the Compagnia di San Luca. 1475 marked the start of his relationship with the Medici family and their entourage: he painted the Portrait of a Young Man with a Medal of Cosimo il Vecchio (Uffizi); a portrait of Giuliano de' Medici (Accademia Carrara, Bergamo; Gemäldegalerie, Berlin; National Gallery of Art, Washington); the Adoration of the Magi (Uffizi) for Gaspare del Lama, a banker connected to the Medici family, and above all the Primavera, the Birth of Venus, and Pallas and the Centaur (Uffizi), painted for Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de Medici. He achieved the full maturity of his style, elegant and linear, appropriate to represent the perfection of a divine world. In 1481-1482 Botticelli was in Rome at the court of Sixtus IV, where he contributed three frescoes to the decoration of the Sistine Chapel. Through his study of antiquities, Botticelli introduced a new magnificence and artlessness into his work. The painter returned to the city of Lorenzo il Magnifico as one of the most prominent artists of his time (the Madonna of the Magnificat, the Madonna of the Pomegranate (Florence, Uffizi), the frescoes in Villa Lemmi for Lorenzo Tornabuoni (Paris, Louvre), the Bardi altarpiece of 1485 (Berlin, Gemäldegalerie), and the Coronation of the Virgin for the chapel of Sant'Alò in San Marco (1488-1490; Florence, Uffizi). In Sandro's last period, according to the biographer Giorgio Vasari, he was influenced by the mystical preaching of the Dominican Fra Girolamo Savonarola. His pictorial language abandoned sensuality becoming more narrative and abstract (the Lamentation over the Dead Christ (Munich, Alte Pinakothek, Milan, Museo Poldi Pezzoli); Calumny (Florence, Uffizi), and his Scenes from the Life of Saint Zenobius (Dresden, Gemäldegalerie; London, National Gallery; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art). This latest style of Botticelli’s was to generate the Florentine proto-Mannerist tendencies of Filippino Lippi and Piero di Cosimo.

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Artwork Name	Artist Name
Adoration of the Magi	Albrecht Dürer
Portrait of the artist's father	Albrecht Dürer
Presentation of Jesus in the Temple	Ambrogio Lorenzetti
Triptic	Andrea Mantegna
Pippo Spano	Andrea del Castagno
Lady with a book of Petrarch's rhyme	Andrea del Sarto
Madonna of the Harpies	Andrea del Sarto
Equestrian portrait of the Emperor Charles V	Anthony Van Dick
Hercules and the Hydra and Hercules and Anteo	Antonio del Pollaiolo
Judith and Holofernes	Artemisia Gentileschi
Tribute to Caesar	Bartolomeo Manfredi
Coronation of the Virgin	Beato Angelico o Fra' Angelico
Portrait of Eleonora di Toledo with her son Giovanni	Bronzino
The Panciatichi Holy Family	Bronzino
View of the Ducal Palace in Venice	Canaletto
View of the Grand Canal	Canaletto
Medusa	Caravaggio
Sacrifice of Isaac	Caravaggio
The adolescent Bacchus	Caravaggio
Maesta of Santa Trinita	Cimabue
Madonna adoring the Child	Correggio
Altarpiece of St Lucia de' Magnoli	Domenico Veneziano
The Rucellai Madonna	Duccio
Madonna of the people	Federico Barocci
Adoration of the Magi	Filippino Lippi
Coronation of the Virgin	Filippo Lippi
Madonna and Child with two Angels	Filippo Lippi
Portrait of the Countess of Chinchon	Francisco de Goya
Adoration of the Magi	Gentile da Fabriano
Adoration of the Child	Gherardo delle Notti o Gheritt van Hontorst
Moses undergoing Trial by Fire	Giorgione o Giorgio da Castelfranco
Saint Remigio Pietà	Giottino
Badia Polyptych	Giotto
The Ognissanti Madonna	Giotto
Sacred Allegory	Giovanni Bellini o Giambellino
Cupid and Psyche	Giuseppe Maria Crespi
Portrait of an Unknown Man with a Letter	Hans Memling
Portrait of a Young Man	Harmensz van Rijn Rembrandt
The Portinari Triptych	Hugo van der Goes
Portrait of Maria Adelaide of France in Turkish-style clothes	Jean Etienne Lìotard
Adoration of the Magi	Leonardo da Vinci
Annunciation	Leonardo da Vinci
Coronation of the Virgin	Lorenzo Monaco
Saint Anne 'Metterza'	Masaccio Masolino
Annunciation	Matthias Stomer
Doni 'Tondo'	Michelangelo Buonarroti
Battle of San Romano	Paolo Uccello
Martyrdom of Saint Justina	Paolo Veronese
Madonna of San Zaccaria	Parmigianino
Madonna with the long neck	Parmigianino
Portrait of Francesco delle Opere	Perugino
Portraits of the Duke and Duchess of Urbino, Federico da Montefeltro and Battista Sforza	Piero della Francesca
Portraits of the Duke and Duchess of Urbino, Federico da Montefeltro and Battista Sforza	Piero della Francesca
Andromeda freed by Perseus	Piero di Cosimo
Triumphal entry of Henri IV in Paris	Pieter Paul Rubens
Madonna and Child Enthroned with Angels	Pietro Lorenzetti
Portrait of Cosimo de' Medici the Elder	Pontormo
Supper at Emmaus	Pontormo
Madonna of the Goldfinch	Raffaello o Raffaello Sanzio
Portrait of Pope Leo X with Cardinals Giulio de' Medici and Luigi de' Rossi	Raffaello o Raffaello Sanzio
Altarpiece of Santa Maria Nuova	Rosso Fiorentino
Musical Angel	Rosso Fiorentino
Adoration of the Magi	Sandro Botticelli
La Primavera (Spring)	Sandro Botticelli
Madonna of the Magnificat	Sandro Botticelli
Pallas and the Centaur	Sandro Botticelli
The Birth of Venus	Sandro Botticelli
The Discovery of Holofernes' Corpse Judith Returns from the Enemy Camp at Bethulia	Sandro Botticelli
Death of Adonis	Sebastiano del Piombo
Annunciation	Simone Martini e Lippo Memmi
Flora	Tiziano
Venus of Urbino	Tiziano
Baptism of Christ	Verrocchio, Leonardo da Vinci

The Birth of Venus, Sandro Botticelli