Venus and Mars United by Love  1580

In this visually opulent and sensual painting, Cupid binds Mars (the god of war) to Venus with a love knot. It celebrates the civilizing and nurturing effects of love, as milk flows from Venus’s breast and Mars’s warhorse is restrained. By 1621 the painting was owned by Emperor Rudolf II in Prague, along with other mythological works by the artist (two are in the Frick Col...