What lies beneath by Lavinia Fontana

Mars and Venus

oil on canvas

Fundacion Casa de Alba, Madrid

MYTHS, age-old and all made up, tell us the truth. Narcissus is alive and well and lives on

Love Island and we still talk about someone’s Achilles heel. In his 1992 bestseller John Gray announced that Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus.

And he made a fortune. Are men all war-like and women no more than beauty and sensual love?

When Lavinia Fontana painted her version of Mars and

Venus in the 1590s, she was in her early 40s. Bearded Mars, though helmeted, is wearing little else but an elegant cloth covers his backside.

His spiky shield and sword are close to hand but the god of war seems to have taken a break from violence, his mind and his right hand are on other things. His intent eyes are on Venus whereas she looks not at him but back towards the viewer.

At their feet an elegant vessel — have they had a glass of wine? — and by her right foot her silver slippers. Her right hand holds a flower. Earrings and a necklace adorn her body in this intimate, bedroom scene but it’s difficult to read her expression. He’s keen.

Is she saying get your paw off my ass mister or is she happy to be seduced? But Mars and Venus prove that opposites attract. Is the sleeping figure on the bed their son, winged Cupid, the god of desire and erotic love?

Lavinia Fontana was unusual in being a woman artist and one of the first female artists to paint female nudes. Born in Bologna, Fontana’s father Prospero was an established artist.

SHE trained in his studio, studied at the University of Bologna and married Gian Paola Zappi, also an artist. They had 11 children but only three outlived her.

Her husband gave up his career, became her agent, was a house husband and her assistant in the studio. Fontana sometimes allowed him to help but only allowed him paint the drapes. In this work the whole scene is framed by opulent, maroon drapes.

Known for her portraits, devotional paintings, large scale works featuring religious and mythological themes, she was also one of the earliest female career artists to rely on commissions for her income. Fontana and her family moved to Rome in 1603 and Pope Paul V sat for her. She died in Rome in August 1614, shortly before her 62nd birthday.