Venus of Urbino
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The Venus of Urbino (1538) is an oil painting by the Italian master Titian. It depicts a nude young woman, identified with the goddess Venus, reclining on a couch or bed in the sumptuous surroundings of a Renaissance palazzo. In his 1880 travelogue A Tramp Abroad, Mark Twain called the Venus of Urbino "the foulest, the vilest, the obscenest picture the world possesses". He proposed that "it was painted for a bagnio and it was probably refused because it was a trifle too strong', adding humorously that "in truth, it is a trifle too strong for any place but a public art gallery". Venus of Urbino inspired the later painting Olympia by Édouard Manet, in which the figure of Venus was replaced with a prostitute.
The pose is based on Giorgione's Sleeping Venus (c. 1510), which also is displayed below, but Titian uses more sensuality in comparison to Giorgione's sublime remoteness.
Devoid as it is of any classical or allegorical trappings ('Venus' displays none of the attributes of the goddess she is supposed to represent), the painting is unapologetically sexy.
The frankness of Venus' expression is often noted; she stares straight at the viewer, unconcerned with her nudity. In her right hand she holds a posy of flowers whilst her left covers her pubic area, provocatively placed in the centre of the composition. In the near background a dog, symbolising fidelity, is asleep.
The painting was commissioned by Guidobaldo II della Rovere, the Duke of Urbino. It would originally have decorated a cassone, a chest traditionally given in Italy as a wedding present. The maids in the background are shown rummaging through a similar chest, apparently in search of the Venus's clothes. Curiously, given its overtly erotic content, the painting was intended as an instructive 'model' for Giulia Varano, the Duke's extremely young bride. The argument for the painting's didacticism was made by the late art historian Rona Goffen in 1997's “Sex, Space, and Social History in Titian’s Venus of Urbino."
It hangs in the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence.
This work of art was an inspiration for the character Fiammetta Bianchini in the book In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant. It is also referenced in Bernard Malamud's short story Naked Nude, where the main character is blackmailed into painting a forgery of it.
Titian made good use of the innovation, linear perspective in this painting.
There is debate whether the model is masturbating or modestly covering herself.
See also
Full text of Mark Twain on the painting
- "You enter, and proceed to that most-visited little gallery that exists in the world--the Tribune--and there, against the wall, without obstructing rag or leaf, you may look your fill upon the foulest, the vilest, the obscenest picture the world possesses--Titian's Venus. It isn't that she is naked and stretched out on a bed--no, it is the attitude of one of her arms and hand. If I ventured to describe that attitude, there would be a fine howl--but there the Venus lies, for anybody to gloat over that wants to--and there she has a right to lie, for she is a work of art, and Art has its privileges. I saw young girls stealing furtive glances at her; I saw young men gaze long and absorbedly at her; I saw aged, infirm men hang upon her charms with a pathetic interest. How I should like to describe her--just to see what a holy indignation I could stir up in the world--just to hear the unreflecting average man deliver himself about my grossness and coarseness, and all that. The world says that no worded description of a moving spectacle is a hundredth part as moving as the same spectacle seen with one's own eyes--yet the world is willing to let its son and its daughter and itself look at Titian's beast, but won't stand a description of it in words. Which shows that the world is not as consistent as it might be.
- There are pictures of nude women which suggest no impure thought--I am well aware of that. I am not railing at such. What I am trying to emphasize is the fact that Titian's Venus is very far from being one of that sort. Without any question it was painted for a bagnio and it was probably refused because it was a trifle too strong. In truth, it is too strong for any place but a public Art Gallery. Titian has two Venuses in the Tribune; persons who have seen them will easily remember which one I am referring to."
