Peter Paul Rubens: The Three Graces

PD Image: The Three Graces (1620-1624), oil on panel painting by artist (s) of the workshop of the Dutch painter and sculptor, Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640), dimensions 119 cm x 99 cm (46.85 in x 38.98 in)

French painter Jacques-Louis David

Jacques-Louis David, Self-portrait (1794), oil on canvas painting, size 80.5 cm x 64.1 cm, located at Louvre Museum, Paris, France.

Equestrian portrait of Stanisław Kostka Potocki (the Polish patron, politician and writer), oil on canvas painting by Jacques-Louis David located at Museum Palace at Wilanów, Warsaw.

The Love of Helen and Paris (detail of a 1788 oil on canvas painting) by Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), size 146 cm x 181 cm, from the former collection of the Comte d'Artois (later Charles X of France), seized during the French Revolution, located in Louvre Museum, Paris.

Cupid and Psyche (1817) painting by Jacques-Louis David located at Cleveland Museum of Art.

French painter Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), known for his mastery of the Neoclassical style, marked a change in taste away from Rococo frivolity towards classical austerity and severity in the 1780s with his history paintings. David was an active supporter of the French Revolution and a friend of Robespierre. After Robespierre's fall from power he was imprisoned, but he aligned himself with Napoleon I, upon his release from prison. David had a large number of pupils, making him the strongest influence in French art of the early 19th century.

Some of the much-acclaimed works of Jacques-Louis David include, The Death of Socrates (1787), Portrait of Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and his wife (1788), The Death of Marat (1793), The Intervention of the Sabine Women (1799), Napoleon at the Saint-Bernard Pass (1801), Portrait of Pope Pius VII (1805), The Coronation of Napoleon (1806), Napoleon in His Study (1812), and Mars Being Disarmed by Venus and the Three Graces (1824), which is considered as David's last major work.

The Three Graces by various artists

PD photo: The Three Graces, a statue near the River Panke (Kunst im Schlosspark Pankow an der Panke: Drei Grazien), photo taken on 4 June 2008. The River Panke is a tributary river of Spree in Berlin, Germany.

PD Photo: ‘Muses’ (The Three Graces), a 1st century fresco from the ancient city of Pompeii, which was destroyed by the eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE.

PD Image: The Three Graces (1504-1505), oil on panel painting by Italian painter and architect Raphael (1483-1520), size 17 cm x 17 cm (6.69 in x 6.69 in) located at Musée Condé, Chantilly in France. Compare Image above with this painting; its close resemblance suggests Raphael probably based his work on the Muses of Pompeii.

PD Photo: The Three Graces in Cyrene Antiquity Museum, Cyrene, Libya: The one-room-sculpture museum at Cyrene has collections rivaling many other museums and it contains many invaluable sculptures showing the richness of Cyrene, which was founded by the ancient Greeks. Several exquisite marble sculptures that once adorned ancient buildings in Cyrene.

PD Photo: The Three Graces (Les-Trois-Grâces), created in 1763 by Charles André van Loo (1705-1765), located at Los Angeles County Museum of Art, USA.

The Three Graces by Antonio Canova located at Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.

In Greek mythology, Charites are goddesses of charm, beauty, nature, human creativity and fertility. In art generally they are depicted as three sisters (from youngest to oldest), Aglaea (for beauty), Euphrosyne (mirth) and Thalia (good cheer). In Roman mythology they are known as the Gratiae, or the Graces. The Graces presided over banquets and gatherings organized to entertain the guests of Gods. They have always been very favourite subjects of paintings and sculptures, for instance, Raphael, Antonio Canova, Bertel Thorvaldsen, and others as in the photos above.

The Greek traveler and geographer of the 2nd century AD Pausanias wrote on the representation of the Graces, "Who it was who first represented the Graces naked, whether in sculpture or in painting, I could not discover. During the earlier period, certainly, sculptors and painters alike represented them draped. At Smyrna, for instance, in the sanctuary of the Nemeses, above the images have been dedicated Graces of gold, the work of Bupalus; and in the Music Hall in the same city there is a portrait of a Grace, painted by Apelles. At Pergamus likewise, in the chamber of Attalus, are other images of Graces made by Bupalus; and near what is called the Pythium there is a portrait of Graces, painted by Pythagoras the Parian. Socrates too, son of Sophroniscus, made images of Graces for the Athenians, which are before the entrance to the Acropolis. Also, Socrates was known to have destroyed his own work as he progressed deeper into his life of philosophy and search of the conscious due to his iconoclastic attitude towards art and the like. All these are alike draped; but later artists, I do not know the reason, have changed the way of portraying them. Certainly to-day sculptors and painters represent Graces naked".

The Charities were generally considered as the daughters of Zeus and Eurynome. According to Homer, they were part of the entourage of Aphrodite. The Charites were also associated with the underworld and the Eleusinian Mysteries.

The Three Graces by Bertel Thorvaldsen

Photo: The Three Graces (1817-18), sculpture by Danish/Icelandic sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844) in Thorvaldsens Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark.

The Three Graces, alabaster sculpture by Leonhard Kern

The Three Graces (pre-1650), alabaster sculpture by German sculptor Leonhard Kern from the collection Kunstkammer Würth, Sammlung Würth at the Bode-Museum, Berlin, Germany.

The Three Graces by Leonhard Kern, view 2

Photo: The Three Graces (1650), ivory carving by Leonhard Kern at Bode-Museum, Berlin, Germany.

The Three Graces, ivory by Leonhard Kern

Photo: The Three Graces (1650), ivory carving by German sculptor Leonhard Kern (1588-1662) from the collection: Kunstkammer Würth, Sammlung Würth, Bode-Museum, Berlin, Germany.

The Three Graces by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux

Photo: The Three Graces (1870) sculpture by French sculptor and painter Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux (1827-1875), located in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA.

The Three Graces painting by Peter Paul Rubens

Image: The Three Graces (1635) oil on canvas painting by Peter Paul Rubens, dimensions 221 cm x 181 cm, last known location at Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain.

The Three Graces at Louvre, view 2

Photo: The Three Graces, marble sculpture at the Louvre Museum, Paris, restored in 1609 by Nicolas Cordier (1565-1612).

The Three Graces at Louvre

Photo: The Three Graces, marble statue by an unknown sculptor at Louvre Museum, Paris, France; restored in 1609 by Nicolas Cordier (1565-1612) for Cardinal Borghese; height 1.19 m (3 ft 10 ¾ in) and width 85 cm (33 ¼ in), from the Borghese Collection, located at Department of Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities, Sully, Ground Floor, Room 17.

The Three Graces by Antonio Canova

Image: The Three Graces, sculpture by Antonio Canova, located at Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.

Mars Being Disarmed by Venus

‘Mars Being Disarmed by Venus’ is the last painting by the French painter Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825). Beginning in 1822 (age 73) during his exile in Brussels he completed it three years later before dying in an accident in 1825. He sent it to an exhibition in Paris from his exile. In 2007 it was displayed in the main hall of the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium in Brussels.

At over 3 m (10 ft) height, its setting is surrealistic with a temple floating in the clouds. Venus, the goddess of love, and her followers, the three Graces and Cupid, are shown taking away the weapons, helmet, shield and armour of Mars the God of War, who allows to be disarmed and gives in to Venus's charms. Also being shown in the painting are The Three Graces.

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.