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Aphrodite, goddess of love, beauty, and
deception, is depicted in an unusual attitude
reclining on her side. She props up her body and
supports its weight on her left elbow. The fingers
of her left hand suggest that she was holding an
attribute, perhaps to be identified as a wine
vessel. Her right arm is elegantly stretched out
along the contour of her body, its fingers
gingerly resting on the lower part of her thigh. In
keeping with ancient conventions of beauty, the
goddess is both full-figured and corpulent, with
emphasis placed on her hips and breasts. Of
particular note are the so-called “rings of Venus”
on her neck. She is shown turning her head to
the spectator’s right and casts the glance of her
originally inlaid eyes down and to the side. The
small, full lips of her mouth and the treatment of
her chin imbue the image with an eternally
seductive quality.
Marble statuettes of this type are well-attested in
the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire and
are particularly associated with Syria, as the
numerous examples in the national museum at
Damascus so amply demonstrate. Few of those
examples, however, depict Aphrodite in this
particular pose, and fewer still are possessed of
the artistic quality of our erotically-charged
example. Our reclining Aphrodite is also a
significant art historical document because it
stands at the head of a long series of Western
representations of aristocratic women in the
guise of Aphrodite reclining. These icons of
Western art include Jean-Auguste Dominique
Ingres’ Odalisque (1814, Musée du Louvre, Paris)
and, of course, Antonio Canova’s Pauline
Borghese as Venus (1808, the Borghese Gallery,
Rome).
References:
Abu-l-Faraj Al-Ush, et al, A Concise Guide to
the National Museum of Damascus [translated by
Muhammad Khalifa] (Damascus), pages 84-86,
First Gallery, showcase no. 1 and no. 2.
- (LO.609)
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