How her abduction by Hades to the underworld brought the seasons. Paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens, Rossetti, and others.
Rubens
Whether gentle, young and pipe-playing or hoary and older, he had the body of a man and the legs of a goat. Is he tender, or ribald?
From bizarre origins as his mother was consumed by fire, and he completed gestation in Zeus’ thigh, to his marriage to Ariadne on the island of Naxos.
Caesar and Cleopatra in Egypt, the suicide of Cato the Younger, Caesar’s triumphs, and the development of a conspiracy to assassinate Caesar.
Although painting and sculpture are closely allied, it’s curious to depict sculpture in painting. Examples range from early grisailles to ribald depictions of the Roman god Priapus.
The popular parable from the Gospel of Luke, told in paintings from the 17th century, including Rubens, Rembrandt, and Murillo.
Wisdom, crafts including weaving, and warfare, she’s a popular figure in paintings from Mantegna to Klimt, and a contestant in the Judgement of Paris.
Most popularly painted in his lovemaking with Aphrodite, Ares developed a life of his own in painted allegories, particularly those of Rubens.
Three classical myths – Atlas turned to stone, Philemon and Baucis, and Leto and the Lycians turned into frogs. Why you should always show hospitality to strangers.
Rome saved from invasion of Lars Porsena and his Tuscans/Etruscans, by the bravery of one man, Horatius Cocles.
