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Despite costing €9 million, the campaign has been slammed by art critics and government officials.For many, Botticelli’s Venus embodies the Renaissance ideal of beauty, but have you ever wondered what that might look like today? Italy’s ministry of tourism has launched a campaign that reimagines the iconic figure as an influencer—and it has been swiftly ridiculed on social media. “Hi there, everybody. My name is Venus,” the ad’s digitally altered protagonist announced on her Instagram. “But that’s something you probably already know. I’m 30, ok maybe just a wee bit more than that… And I am a virtual influencer. What...

Medici philosopher's mystery death is solved By Malcolm Moore, Rome Correspondent Last Updated: 2:35am GMT 07/02/2008 After 500 years, one of Renaissance Italy's most enduring murder mysteries has been solved by forensic scientists. Ever since Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, a mystical and mercurial philosopher at the court of Lorenzo de' Medici, suddenly became sick and died in 1494, it has been rumoured that foul play was involved. Scientists display the bones of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola Pico's fame has faded, but he was a celebrated figure at the Medici court. He gained notoriety when, at the age of 23, he...

talian eco-zealots glue their hands to Botticelli's masterpiece Primavera at a Florence art gallery in the latest climate change stunt inspired by Just Stop Oil vandals. Three environmental activists attached themselves to the glass cover of the iconic renaissance painting in the Sala Botticelli of the Uffizi Gallery in Italy at 10:30am on Friday. The protest was carried out by an unnamed man and two women - from the climate activist group Ultima Generazione 'Last Generation' - who rolled out a banner in front of them that read: 'Last Generation No Gas No Coal'. The activists, who had paid for...

Environmental protesters have glued themselves to the glass protecting Sandro Botticelli’s Primavera which is on display at an art gallery in Florence. The activists, from the climate activist group Ultima Generazione (Last Generation), said the protest was the first in “a new season of actions” targeting museums. It appeared inspired by Just Stop Oil activists in the UK who recently conducted a similar campaign of protests in art galleries. Two protesters stuck their palms to the exhibit at the Uffizi gallery beforehand, with the help of a third, unfurling a banner reading “Ultima Generazione No Gas No Carbone (Last Generation,...

In around 1485 or 1486, Florentine artist Sandro Botticelli came up with probably his most famous painting, the "Birth of Venus." Botticelli’s choice of subject was nothing new. Venus and her equivalents, including the Greek Aphrodite and the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar, are among the most common figures depicted in art. Archaeologists dub one of the oldest of all sculptures, the “Venus of Willendorf,” on the assumption that this 25,000-year-old work was intended to represent a Stone Age fertility goddess similar to the Venus of later tradition. In virtually all civilizations, a Venus equivalent plays a prominent role in myth, legend...

A painting of Christ by Italian Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli sold for $45.4 million at auction Thursday, some $5 million more than expected, Sotheby's announced. The portrait of a resurrected Christ, The Man of Sorrows, was the marquee item in the auction house's New York Old Master paintings sale. It fetched the highest price for a Renaissance painting in the past five years. "As the first major sale of 2022, today's auction result is a resounding vote of confidence for the international art market and the market for Old Masters," said Christopher Apostle, head of Sotheby's Old Masters Painting Department....

Sotheby’s Dubai has opened its exhibit of Sandro Botticelli’s The Man of Sorrows, a rare example of the artist’s later work. The painting is expected to sell at an estimated excess of $40 million at Sotheby’s Old Masters sale in New York in January, and it's on view in Dubai until Tuesday. The brooding portrait of the resurrected Christ was executed in the late 15th or early 16th centuries – the last decade of the artist’s life. For Christopher Apostle, head of Old Master Paintings at Sotheby’s New York, the work presents an unusual moment in the artist’s oeuvre. “Botticelli...

Thursday’s long-awaited Old Masters sale at Sotheby’s New York had been billed as potentially being the biggest sale of its kind ever with a pre-sale estimate, not including buyers’ premium, of $121.9 million–$142.8 million. But after three lots were withdrawn, including a highly rated $20 million–$30 million Rembrandt from the collection of Metropolitan Museum of Art trustee Mark Fisch, that estimate was reduced to $100 million–$110 million. Nonetheless, the sale continued Sotheby’s New York winter Old Master sales steady upward trajectory, arguably at the expense of the London equivalents. Since 2017, totals from these sales have risen from $35.8 million...

Botticelli Portrait Expected to Fetch $80 Million at Sotheby’s NEW YORK – Sotheby’s is preparing to sell next week a rare portrait by Italian painter Sandro Botticelli that experts value at $80 million, a record for an old master print that is in exceptional condition and is one of the only three portraits of the Renaissance artist remaining in private hands. “In my 30 years of professional career, I have never had a Botticelli that comes close to the quality, the condition, the beauty and the importance of it,” Christopher Apostle, New York director of the Sotheby’s department of Old...