Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Paintings by Peter Paul Rubens
This room holds big, colorful, emotional works by Peter Paul Rubens and others from
Catholic Flanders (Belgium). While Protestant and democratic Europe painted simple
scenes, Catholic and aristocratic countries turned to the style called Baroque. Baroque art
took what was flashy in Venetian art and made it flashier, what was gaudy and made it
gaudier, what was dramatic and made it shocking.
Rubens painted anything that would raise your pulse—battles, miracles, hunts, and,
especially, fleshy women with dimples on all four cheeks. For instance,
The Judgment of
Paris
(one of two versions by Rubens in this museum) is little more than an excuse for a
study of the female nude, showing front, back, and profile all on one canvas.
• Exit Room 29 at the far end. In Room 30 (with red wallpaper), on the left-hand wall,
you'll find...
Velázquez—
The Rokeby Venus
(c. 1647-1651)
Like a Venetian centerfold, Venus lounges diagonally across the canvas, admiring herself,
with flaring red, white, and gray fabrics to highlight her rosy white skin and inflame our
passion. Horny Spanish kings loved Titianesque nudes despite Spain's strict Inquisition,
