The Birth of Venus

The Birth of Venus was one of the great successes of the 1863 Paris Salon. Typical of Cabanel's virtuoso technique, this painting is a perfect example of the popular and official artistic taste of the period.

As we can read on the Musée d'Orsay's website: "Cabanel took as his subject a famous episode from classical mythology when Venus is born of sea-foam and carried ashore. This theme, very popular in the 19th century, provided some artists with the opportunity to introduce eroticism without offending public morality, under the pretext of representing a classical subject. For Cabanel, the mythological theme is indeed a pretext for the portrayal of a nude figure, which, though idealized, is nonetheless depicted in a lascivious pose."

Émile Zola denounced this ambiguity: "The goddess, drowned in a sea of milk, resembles a delicious courtesan, but not of flesh and blood—that would be indecent—but made of a sort of pink and white marzipan."

This is a classic motif in a 19th-century version. How do you like it?  You can find a couple of other representations of Venus in art here.