From reinvented Antiquity to modern art · gods, metamorphoses and passions

Venus is born from foam, Bacchus leaps towards Ariadne, Jupiter hides in the cloud and Perseus delivers Andromeda: myth gives painters an infinite grammar of desire, danger and transformation.

Mythological scenes are not simple illustrations of ancient stories. Since the Renaissance, painters have reread Homer, Ovid and ancient culture to talk about their own time. Botticelli brings Venus to Cyprus in a composition of line and breath; Titian transforms the meeting of Bacchus and Ariadne into a collision of two processions and two destinies. Correggio envelops Jupiter and Io in a cloud where the god literally becomes pictorial material. Piero di Cosimo, with Perseus delivering Andromeda, combines monster, coastal crowd and heroism in a world of almost theatrical strangeness. Piero di Cosimo, with Perseus delivering Andromeda, combines monster, coastal crowd and heroism in a world of almost theatrical strangeness. From one painting to another, attributes, gestures and landscapes allow to identify the characters, but each artist shifts the meaning of the story through color, framing and the chosen moment. The "Famous Mythological Scenes" selection notably compares The Birth of Venus and Bacchus and Ariadne. His reading favors drawing.

The myth remains alive because it never provides a single image: each painter chooses the moment when the story can change.