Primavera, painting by Sandro Botticelli

Photo: Primavera (1482), icon of the springtime renewal of the Florentine Renaissance, also at the summer palazzo of Pierfrancesco de' Medici, as a companion piece to The Birth of Venus and Pallas and the Centaur. Seen from left to right are Mercury, the Three Graces, Venus, Flora, Chloris and Zephyrus.

The masterpieces of Sandro Botticelli, Primavera (1482) and The Birth of Venus (1485) were seen at the villa of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici at Castello in the mid-16th century, and until recently, it was assumed that both works were painted specifically for the villa. But recent studies suggest the Primavera was painted for Lorenzo's townhouse in Florence, and The Birth of Venus was commissioned by someone else for a different site. The influence of Gothic realism is tempered by Botticelli's study of the antique. But the subjects themselves remain fascinating for their ambiguity. The complex meanings of these paintings continue to receive widespread scholarly attention.

Pallas and the Centaur: painting by Botticelli

Photo: Pallas and the Centaur, a painting by Botticelli

Pallas et le Centaure (Pallas and the Centaur, 1482), a painting by the Italian Renaissance period painter Sandro Botticelli, is preserved in the Uffizi of Florence, Italy. The painting's bare landscape focuses one's gaze on two figures. First, a centaur has trespassed on the forbidden territory. This lusty being, half horse and half man, is being brought under control by a guard-nymph armed with a shield and halberd, and she has grabbed him by the hair. The woman has been identified both as the goddess Pallas Athena and the Amazon Camilla, chaste heroine of Virgil's Aeneid. The two aspects of the human soul, reason and instinct fighting one another, are represented by the double nature of the centaur. The latter, whose classical epithet is Chiron, was perhaps inspired by a classic relief, though the pathetic expression is wholly by Botticelli.

The Birth of Venus by Botticelli

The Birth of Venus, a painting of AD 1486 by Sandro Botticelli, depicts the goddess Venus, having emerged from the sea as a full grown woman, arriving at the seashore. The painting, tempera on canvas (dimensions: 172.5 cm × 278.5 cm / 67.9 in × 109.6 in), is held in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.
Venus is a Roman goddess associated with love, beauty and fertility. Venus played a key role in Roman religious festivals and mythology. From third century BC, the Hellenization of Roman upper classes identified her as the equivalent of the Greek goddess Aphrodite.
The Birth of Venus, now among the most familiar masterpieces of Florentine art, is the work of Sandro Botticelli (c 1445 - May 17, 1510), an Italian painter of the Florentine school during the Early Renaissance period.