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Landscape with Venus and Adonis
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
Venus, the goddess of love, is unsuccessful in dissuading her mortal lover Adonis from hunting the boar that would eventually kill him. The artist nestles this story in the foreground of an expansive view with Germanic architecture, rather than a classical setting. Woodlands were relatively new subjects in European painting and this work points toward the full-blown forested landscapes of the 1600s.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineLandscape with Venus and Adonis, 1580s. Gillis van Coninxloo (Netherlandish, 1544–1607). Oil on copper; framed: 48.3 x 64.5 x 7 cm (19 x 25 3/8 x 2 3/4 in.); unframed: 37.8 x 53.6 cm (14 7/8 x 21 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund, 1962.293
