Venus Verticordia (painting)

Patron John Mitchell of Bradford commissioned the painting from Rossetti in 1863, after seeing a chalk drawing by the artist of the model whose body was eventually used for Venus Verticordia. This model was an unnamed woman, described as “a remarkably handsome cook whom he met in the street”.[2] Rossetti worked on the painting until 1868, it was then sent to Mitchell in 1869. In 1867 Rossetti had altered the face of the Venus, changing from the features of the first model to those of Alexa Wilding.[3] In his ‘Notes on the Royal Academy Exhibition, 1868’ Algernon Charles Swinburne wrote that "The great picture of Venus Verticordia has now been in great measure recast; the head is of a diviner type of beauty; golden butterflies hover about the halo of her hair; alight upon the apple or the arrow in her hands; her face has the sweet supremacy of a beauty imperial and immortal; her glorious bosom seems to exult and expand as the roses on each side of it. The painting of leaf and fruit and flower in this picture is beyond my praise or any man’s; but of one thing I will here take note; the flash of green brilliance from the upper leaves of the trellis against the sombre green of the trees behind. Once more it must appear that the painter alone can translate into words as perfect in music and colour the sense and spirit of his work."[4] The painting became part the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum collection in 1945,[5] after being purchased with assistance from the National Art Collections Fund.

The first and only major oil painting featuring a nude to be painted by Rossetti, Venus Verticordia features blatantly erotic symbolism. She is surrounded by a mass of roses and honeysuckles, during the 19th century Victorian period there was a heightened interest in the Language of flowers, and these flowers would have been understood in this context as sensual metaphors of women's sexuality/genitals.[6] As an artist, Rossetti also used the rose and honeysuckle flowers as symbols for sexual passion.[7] The golden-tipped arrow held by Venus is ‘Cupids arrow’, Cupid being the son of Venus and the god of desire, and it points towards the left side of the chest and her own heart. This suggesting to the viewer the invocation of uncontrollable desire.[8]

The golden apple in the painting refers to Greek mythology, as the prize won by Venus (Aphrodite) in a beauty contest referred to as the Judgement of Paris. In Greek mythology this story involves events leading up to the Trojan War, and in it Paris (mythology) is a man swayed by his desire for the beautiful woman Helen of Troy – offered to him by Aphrodite (Venus).[9] The apple also suggests the idea of Forbidden fruit and the story of the tempting of Eve by Sin in the Garden of Eden, as occurs in the Book of Genesis. This Christian iconography is at odds with the halo surrounding Venus - as a usual sign of holiness, and in the case of female figures, purity.[10] The yellow butterflies, eight flying through Venus’ halo, and another two on her hands, may have several meanings. Butterflies have traditionally been seen as symbols of the soul, these butterflies may represent the soul of Venus, or the involvement of the soul as well as the body in affairs of love and desire.[11]

A poem Rossetti wrote to accompany the painting indicates his own interpretation of the term – as Venus turning men's hearts from fidelity to lust.[12]

VENUS VERTICORDIA. (For a Picture.)

She hath the apple in her hand for thee,

Yet almost in her heart would hold it back;

She muses, with her eyes upon the track

Of that which in thy spirit they can see.

Haply, ‘Behold, he is at peace,’ saith she;

‘Alas! the apple for his lips,—the dart

That follows its brief sweetness to his heart,—

The wandering of his feet perpetually!’

A little space her glance is still and coy;

But if she give the fruit that works her spell,

Those eyes shall flame as for her Phrygian boy.

Then shall her bird's strained throat the woe foretell,

And her far seas moan as a single shell,

And through her dark grove strike the light of Troy.[13]

Well known art critic and long-time supporter of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood John Ruskin strongly objected to the sexual tone and imagery in this painting. As Rossetti moved away from his early, more conventional Pre-Raphaelite style, his work began to clash with Ruskin's conservative nature. Letters between the two colleagues and friends indicate their falling out, and Ruskin's concerns with the imagery in Venus Verticordia after seeing it in Rossetti's artist studio.[14]

"I purposely used the word ‘wonderfully’ painted about those flowers. They were wonderful to me, in their realism; awful – I can use no other word – in their coarseness.”–Excerpt of a letter to Rossetti from John Ruskin, 1865[15]

• Bentley, D. M. R. "‘Of Venus and of Cupid,— Strange Old Tales’ in the Work of D. G. Rossetti.” Victorian Review 34, no. 2 (2008): 83–102.
• Doughty, Oswald. A Victorian Romantic: Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Second Edition. London: Oxford University Press, 1960.
• Marsh, Jan. Pre-Raphaelite Women: Images of Femininity in Pre-Raphaelite Art. London: Phoenix Illustrated, 1998.
• Stephens, Frederic George and William Michael Rossetti. Dante Gabriel Rossetti. London; New York: Seeley; Macmillan, 1894: (Venus Verticordia p. 66)

• Venus Verticordia, Dante Gabriel Rossetti - Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool Museums.
• Venus Verticordia - Rossetti Archive