Introduction of Venus
This is the crouching venus statue created by Lely. Venus, the goddess of beauty in Roman mythology, is one of the twelve main gods in Rome. It corresponds to Aphrodite in Greek mythology. At first, she may be a kind of wizard in the orchard. Her alias is Multia, which may mean “peach” in Latin. In the later period, Venus also became the goddess of beauty and love because it was corresponding to the Aphrodite in Greek mythology, and Cupid was her son. The Latin words “Venus” and “Friday” all come from this. Venus also appeared in many literary works of previous dynasties and western oil paintings. The most influential art is the statue of Venus found in the cave of Milos Island in the Aegean Sea in 1820.
The Lely Venus
“The formal name of Hall 23 is the Statue of Crouching Aphrodite, 1.12M high, also known as the Venus squatting, which is a Roman version of the original Greek work in 200 BC. The original statue, probably made of bronze or marble, is now missing. This statue can be dated back to the Antonian period (2nd century AD) and may have been made in the 1st or 2nd century AD.
Venus bathed with her pitcher under her left thigh. She squatted naked, trying to cover herself with her arms. Her beautiful head, with a bun on her head, turned nervously to one side, perhaps in the direction of an intruder.
The influence of the nude venus statue
The three-dimensional sense of the statue is a typical representative of ancient Greek statues, as is its delicate hairstyle. Since the late Renaissance, this style of sculpture has influenced its later sculptors, and since the early 1500s, it has influenced artists of other styles.
This naked goddess statue is undoubtedly an important innovation of ancient Greek statues. Before that, only male statues were naked. Later, Greek sculptors created several new types of naked Aphrodite, which further emphasized the worship of love and beauty. At the same time, this trend may reflect the improvement of women’s social status and the change of men’s attitude towards women.
