Nicolas Poussin - Sleeping Venus with Cupid

Nicolas Poussin - Sleeping Venus with Cupid
  • Title: Sleeping Venus with Cupid
  • Artist: Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665)
  • Date: c. 1628
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 73 x 99 cm

"Sleeping Venus with Cupid" depicts a naked Venus, the Roman goddess of love, sleeping under trees accompanied at her feet by her son Cupid with his bow and arrow. A cherub sits at her side clutching more arrows. The brightly painted body of Venus in the foreground is set against a darkly painted rural background, in which two men are gazing lustfully at her from behind a tree and a pair of lovers are in the middleground.

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