Aphrodite in the British Museum

Purchased as the Prize Winner from the 'Alumni Exhibition' at the School of Art, 10 December 2007 - 25 January 2008. The exhibition was curated to mark the centenary of the opening of the Edward Davies Building in 1907. The sculpture is a 2nd century AD version of an original from Hellenistic Greece. In the fourth century BC the sculptor Praxiteles created a life-size naked statue of Aphrodite. It was placed in a shrine in her temple at Knidos in south-western Turkey. It was an important innovation in classical sculpture, and subsequent Hellenistic sculptors created several new types of nude Aphrodite figures. Most of these statues show Aphrodite ineffectually attempting to cover her nakedness with her hands. In this statue the voluptuous Aphrodite crouches down and turns her head sharply to her right, as if surprised by her audience. This statue is sometimes known as 'Lely's Venus' since it once belonged to the baroque portrait painter Sir Peter Lely (1618-80). It was subsequently acquired by King Charles I (reigned 1625-49) and is presently on loan to the Britsh Museum from the collection of the Royal Family. Reference, British Museum website