Venus and Adonis 1587

Venus, the goddess of love, did not want her lover Adonis to go hunting. She was afraid that he would come to harm. Her fears were justified: Adonis was killed by a wild boar. The tall, slender figures with small heads typify Spranger’s elegant Mannerist style. The landscape is curiously old-fashioned; it was copied from an early 16th-century painting.