The Crouching Venus at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London

Some time ago I wrote about “A crouching Aphrodite in London“, a sculpure I saw at the British Museum. It is Roman, 2nd century AD; a version of an original from Hellenistic Greece.

Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London
Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London

Today I want to introduce “The crouching Venus” (1702) of John Nost the Elder, which I saw at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London
Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London

I quote form the Museum’s website:

“The Crouching Venus is a remarkable instance of John Nost the Elder’s assured carving, and is a rare surviving example of a classical subject by the artist in marble. The sculpture’s scale and accomplishment give it a grandeur and presence which were truly exceptional at that date in Britain. Like the antique prototype, Venus is depicted ineffectually attempting to cover her nakedness, her gesture only succeeding in drawing attention to her sensual body. The goddess is thought to be bathing, or possibly adjusting her hair, and caught unawares. Nost’s sculpture suggests the sophisticated level of patronage of the wealthy gentry in Britain at the start of the eighteenth century, and tantalisingly evokes the way in which interiors of eighteenth-century country houses were adorned with sculpture.”

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

I must confess that I did not know of the artist before I saw the crouching Venus.

What attracted my attention to it was that it looked very similar to the crouching Aphrodite I Saw at the British Museum. As a matter of fact, it seemed to me that it was a copy of the Roman-Hellenistic sculpture.

(Quite interestingly, there is no mention of such likeness in the V&A description.)

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Let us start from the left arm and the band around it.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

The head is the next area of examination.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The face, the hair style and the expression are the same. However, Aphrodite turns to her far left her face and looks down, while Venus just turns and looks straight.

Also, Venus clinches loosely her right fist, while Aphodite’s right hand’s fingers are straight.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

Venus is slightly slimmer than Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Aphrodite’s figure is sumptuous.

Let us now have a look at the left hand.

Crouchnig Venus - detail
Crouchnig Venus – detail

The hand in both sculptures is “locked” between the thigh and the elbow.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The only difference appears to be the angle to the thigh and the fingers. One should point out though that quite obviously, Aphrodite’s fingers are reconstructed, as they were broken in the sculpture’s journey through the centuries.

Finally, the back side.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

This may be the final and concluding observation regarding the hypothesis that the V&A Venus is a copy of the British Museum Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The posture of the body, the support of the jug, the tension of the muscles.

It seems that Venus is a copy of Aphrodite after all! 

Which of the two do I like best?

 

Pompeii and Herculaneum (Ercolano): A journey back in 1st century AD

View of Pompei with Vesuvius in the background
View of Pompeii with Vesuvius in the background

Pompeii has always exerted a special influence on me. The sudden destruction, the charred remains, the mountain-volcano waiting to errupt again, have made me aware of the volatility of life and at the same time provided a link to the past that I always wanted to explore. In this post I will trace some of my steps in Pompeii, and then to Herculaneum (Ercolano), the less known buried town.

Cemetery Road in Pompei
Cemetery Road in Pompei
The city of Pompei is not easy to visit. There are busy spots where people are overflowing, and the quiet spots, where you can enjoy the site. One of the them is the cemetery road. As if the visitors want to leave the dead in their peace, when the whole city is dead. Apparently, one part is more dead than the other.
But this is the place where the dead can be alive, as in Hanhold’s dellusions (Gradiva, a novel by W. Jensen). Hanhold is a young archaeologist who comes to Pompei and has these visions of a woman resembling “Gradiva” walking the empty streets of Pompei during the night. After reading Jensen’s novel, Freud wrote one his best texts “Delusion and Dream in Jensen’s Gradiva”.
In any case, were Hanhold with use today, he would be chasing his female dream figure “Gradiva” in one of these streets that take you to the cemetery of Pompeii.
Street in Pompei
Street in Pompei
The busy streets of Pompei are literally packed with visitors.
Bacchus
Bacchus
Bacchus was very popular in the city where people knew how to have a good time. This fresco is outside a tavern.
Painting inside a house
Painting inside a house

 Paintings were very popular in Pompei. A lot of artists were trained by the Greeks. This one is inside one of the houses of Pompei.

The garden in the back
The garden in the back
There are some spectacular villas all over the city, with gardens that look like this. This is in the middle of the city!
Villa of the Mysteries
Villa of the Mysteries
The most spectacular of these villas, in terms of frescos is the Villa of the Mysteries.
Villa of the Mysteries
Villa of the Mysteries
These paintings are powerful and colourful! They give you a totally different pespective of life and arts in the Greco-Roman world.
Overall, the site is huge, busy to the extreme and requires multiple visits for the visitor to absorb and feel the environment. Not an easy task, considering that the heat can be severe during the day.
Pompei Forum
Pompei Forum

 Leaving the colourful crouds and the busy streets of Pompei, it is imperative to visit the sleepy city of Ercolano, a few kilometers northwest.

After driving on the fantastic A1 which is like a ditch with many narrow lanes with cars doing well over 100 km/hour in all lanes, I Arrived in the town of Ercolano, which is a rather depressing town built on top of a hill, looking over the Naples Bay. I followed the signs to “Scavi” and found myself in an empty parking lot, from which I walked one kilometer in narrow streets in order to get to the netrance of the Herculaneum site. It is worh every meter of it!

Ercolano
Ercolano
Ercolano is an oasis of tranquility after Pompei. It was a smaller and wealthier city than Pompeii. Today is much lesser known in the world. Which explains the fact that there were in al about 20 visitors compared to the thoussands of Pompeii.
Here you can really sense the past. The visitors are scattered and quiet. The place exhumes serenity and is much better preserved compared to Pompei. The structures are almost intact in places, and you have the feeling that you trully are in another age.
Inside a villa of Ercolano
Inside a villa of Ercolano (House of the Deer)

The place is so inviting that you want to sit down and get a cup of coffee!

Open interior of a villa in Ercolano
Open interior of a villa in Ercolano

The painted columns are my favourites!

Street in Ercolano
Street in Ercolano

The streets in Ercolano are narrower than the ones in Pompei. The environment is more intimate, and really takes you many many centuries back !

Neptune and Amphitrite
Neptune and Amphitrite

This wonderful mosaic of Neptune and Amphitrite is a fine example of art in the first century AD.

Mosaic in Ercolano
Mosaic in Ercolano

I left Herculaneum with a sense of true discovery and inner peace.