A More Formal Look at Primavera

A Formal Look at a Work of Italian Early Renaissance Art

The work I have selected is Primavera (Spring) by Sandro Botticelli, c. 1482. Tempura on wood panel. 6’8”x10’4”.  Painted for the wedding of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici and Semiramide d’Appiano, this work celebrates many changes:  from maiden to wife, winter to spring, darkness to light, sterility to fertility and Medieval to Renaissance.  

Tempura paint is usually considered to be more challenging to use and less versatile than oils, indeed, it does dry quickly and demands that the artist who uses it be technically proficient and sure of him or herself.  Each stroke of paint must be thought over and planned out as it will likely stay as a part of the composition; and yet luminous color and a broad range of hues are possible and quite evident in this work.  The rich, dark, greenish blacks of the foliage in both the background and foreground and especially the dark shrub behind the central figure of Venus (Aphrodite) dramatically displays the classical subject matter of the scene.  The light blue sky color weaves through the trunks of the trees and contrasts with most of the figures except Zephyrus who is the west wind from the sky and shows up as mainly the same color.  Tempura paint is an excellent medium to represent the diaphanous gowns of the Three Graces and Chloris before she undergoes her transformation into the fertile Flora.  Tempura paint also makes possible the great delicacy of the depiction of individual, recognizable flowers, floral decoration on Flora’s garment, along with hair and facial features.  The flowers are of recognizable May-flowering species to further the idea of the change from winter to spring.

This is quite a flat piece, the background of orange trees and especially the shrubbery behind Venus seem to form a wall, and the distraction of an atmospheric perspective is not welcome here.  The message of the changes of life and time is displayed in the actions and placement of the figures.  Most of the lines made by the figures and continued into the tree trunks have a lot of verticality but Zephyrus and Chloris lean to the center.  The raised arms of Mercury and the Three Graces add to the verticality but also help to frame the figure of Venus realized as a bride.  She and Flora echo each other as happy matrons.

Most of the figures are facing toward the viewer’s left, there are nine of them and they can be placed into triads with some thought.  The group on the right is of Zephyrus and Chloris/Flora.  Chloris twists to face Zephyrus as he accosts her as a maiden nymph; she looks apprehensive and disturbed as if she wants to get away, and is almost falling to the ground to do so.  She seems to resist the change in herself brought by Zephyrus and yet in her next incarnation, just to the left, she smiles at the viewer and seems satisfied as the fertile Flora, in the month of May, strewing her flowers like blessings upon the world.  Her change, though not welcomed at first, has transformed her into a more powerful and fully realized being- even her garment is more solid, less sheer.  This triad is balanced by the three graces of Chastity, Beauty and Love, right of center, who hold hands and dance their dance unchanged through time.  Cupid aims an arrow at them but doesn’t let it fly; he’s teasing them with the possibility of change but he is ignored.  The next triad is more disjointed.  It consists of Venus, Cupid and Mercury as a sort of family group (in classic myth Adonis is usually Venus’s lover).  Mercury is placed to the far left and is engaged in the activity of clearing the winter clouds and this change prepares the stage for the other figures. His position at the edge of the piece shows the husband as the one who goes out into the world and performs some activity to support the family. Venus is in a prominent place, central to the piece as the goddess of wedded love.  She looks out at the viewer serenely, seeming much like depictions of the Virgin Mary, except her child flies above on his own wings on his own independent trajectory rather than being displayed by Venus.  He is the agent of changes brought about by love, changes which seem random at first but may be predestined.  The message of this composition seems to be that though change might not be looked for or wanted the change from chastity to fertility- within the conventions of marriage- and from darkness to light are to be embraced.  The other changes shown in the piece all frame and support this ideal.