The Cleveland Museum of Art
Collection Online as of April 24, 2024
Love Requests Venus to Return His Weapons to Him
1768
(French, 1736–1793)
after François Boucher
(French, 1703–1770)
Sheet: 30 x 39.8 cm (11 13/16 x 15 11/16 in.); Platemark: 27.3 x 36.7 cm (10 3/4 x 14 7/16 in.)
James Parmelee Fund 2006.182
Catalogue raisonné: Herold 17, state I/V
Location: not on view
Description
For his aristocratic patrons, Boucher made numerous paintings of intriguing female nudes, thinly veiled as Roman goddesses lounging in luxury. Bonnet’s color chalk-manner prints of similar subjects offered middle-class buyers sumptuous yet affordable versions of Boucher’s wildly popular images. Here, a tiny cupid pleads with Venus for his quiver of arrows as she gazes teasingly at the viewer. Their feathered ends simultaneously conceal and draw attention to her nudity. With cupid’s arrows in her control, it is Venus—rather than cupid—who has the power to arouse feelings of love.- Elegance and Intrigue: French Society in 18th-century Prints and Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 16-November 6, 2016).
- {{cite web|title=Love Requests Venus to Return His Weapons to Him|url=false|author=Louis-Marin Bonnet, François Boucher|year=1768|access-date=24 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}
Source URL:
https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2006.182