Aphrodite is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, procreation, and as her syncretized Roman counterpart Venus, desire, sex, fertility, prosperity, and victory. Aphrodite's major symbols include seashells, myrtles, roses, doves, sparrows, and swans. The cult of Aphrodite was largely derived from that of the Phoenician goddess Astarte, a cognate of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar, whose cult was based on the Sumerian cult of Inanna. Aphrodite's main cult centers were Cythera, Cyprus, Corinth, and Athens. Her main festival was the Aphrodisia, which was celebrated annually in midsummer. In Laconia, Aphrodite was worshipped as a warrior goddess. She was also the patron goddess of prostitutes, an association which led early scholars to propose the concept of "sacred prostitution" in Greco-Roman culture, an idea which is now generally seen as erroneous.
Venus is a Roman goddess whose functions encompass love, beauty, desire, sex, fertility, prosperity, and victory. In Roman mythology, she was the ancestor of the Roman people through her son, Aeneas, who survived the fall of Troy and fled to Italy. Julius Caesar claimed her as his ancestor. Venus was central to many religious festivals, and was revered in Roman religion under numerous cult titles.
The Birth of Venus is a painting by the Italian artist Sandro Botticelli, probably executed in the mid-1480s. It depicts the goddess Venus arriving at the shore after her birth, when she had emerged from the sea fully-grown. The painting is in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy.
Ītzpāpalōtl was a goddess in Aztec religion.
Venus and Adonis is a narrative poem by William Shakespeare published in 1593. It is probably Shakespeare's first publication.
Vanna Marie White is an American television personality and game-show hostess, best known as the co-host of the game show Wheel of Fortune, a position she has held since 1982. She began her career as a model while studying fashion, competing in Miss Georgia USA in 1978. In addition to her work on Wheel of Fortune, she has played minor characters or appeared as herself in many films and television series, and is the author of the 1987 autobiography Vanna Speaks. She also participates in real-estate investment, owns the yarn brand Vanna's Choice, and is a patron of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
One Touch of Venus is a 1943 musical with music written by Kurt Weill, lyrics by Ogden Nash, and book by S. J. Perelman and Nash, based on the 1885 novella The Tinted Venus by Thomas Anstey Guthrie, and very loosely spoofing the Pygmalion myth. The show satirizes contemporary American suburban values, artistic fads and romantic and sexual mores. Weill had been in America for eight years by the time he wrote this musical, and his music, though retaining his early haunting power, had evolved into a very different Broadway style.
Franz Planer, A.S.C. was an Austrian-American cinematographer.
Venus is the name of two fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The first, was based on the goddess Venus (Aphrodite) from Roman and Greek mythology and appeared in her own series in the 1950s.This character is stated to be the true goddess, who later only had been referred to by her Greek name, Aphrodite. The second character was to be a siren that only resembled the goddess, having been retconned in Marvel story. The similarities between the two characters were a point of conflict in the comics.
One Touch of Venus is a 1948 American black-and-white romantic musical comedy film starring Robert Walker, Ava Gardner, Dick Haymes, and Eve Arden. Directed by William A. Seiter, the Universal-International release was based on the 1943 Broadway musical of the same name, book written by S. J. Perelman and Ogden Nash, with music composed by Kurt Weill. However, the film omits most of Weill's music. The actors did their own singing, except for Ava Gardner (Venus) whose singing was dubbed by Eileen Wilson. The plot is from an original 1885 novella by Thomas Anstey Guthrie.
Mars Being Disarmed by Venus is the last painting produced by the French artist Jacques-Louis David. He began it in 1822 during his exile in Brussels and completed it three years later, before dying in an accident in 1825. The work combines idealization with elements of realism. Specifically, David integrated the idealized forms of mythological painting with a realist attention to detail. This combination of two seemingly incompatible principles also plays an important role in the themes of the painting, most notably in its treatment of masculinity and femininity.
In classical mythology, Cupid is the god of desire, erotic love, attraction and affection. He is often portrayed as the son of the love goddess Venus and the god of war Mars. He is also known as Amor. His Greek counterpart is Eros. Although Eros is generally portrayed as a slender winged youth in Classical Greek art, during the Hellenistic period, he was increasingly portrayed as a chubby boy. During this time, his iconography acquired the bow and arrow that represent his source of power: a person, or even a deity, who is shot by Cupid's arrow is filled with uncontrollable desire. In myths, Cupid is a minor character who serves mostly to set the plot in motion. He is a main character only in the tale of Cupid and Psyche, when wounded by his own weapons, he experiences the ordeal of love. Although other extended stories are not told about him, his tradition is rich in poetic themes and visual scenarios, such as "Love conquers all" and the retaliatory punishment or torture of Cupid.
Vanna Vanna Pookkal is a 1992 Indian Tamil-language romantic drama film, directed by Balu Mahendra, starring Prashanth, Mounika and Vinodhini. The film, produced by Kalaipuli S. Thanu, was released on 15 January 1992, and won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Tamil at the 39th National Film Awards. The film completed a hundred-day run at the box-office.
Bride of Deimos is a Japanese dark fantasy manga series written by Etsuko Ikeda and illustrated by Yuuho Ashibe. It premiered in Princess magazine in December 1974, later moving to Viva Princess, where it ran until the magazine became defunct with the release of its October 1990 issue. Akita Shoten collected the chapters into 17 compiled volumes published under the Princess Comics imprint; ComicsOne licensed the series for an English-language release in North America and published seven volumes before going out of business. In August 1988, the manga inspired an original video animation (OVA) adaptation directed by Rintaro and produced by Madhouse. In May 2007, Bride of Deimos resumed serialization in Monthly Bonita magazine, with the subtitle "The Final Chapter". It was put on hiatus in April 2014, with six compiled volumes published as of May 2014.
Rudolf Thome is a German film director and producer. He has directed more than 30 films since 1964. His 1986 film Tarot was entered into the 15th Moscow International Film Festival.
The Garden of Love is a painting by Rubens, produced in around 1633 and now in the Prado Museum in Madrid. The work was first listed in 1666, when it was hung in the Royal Palace of Madrid, in the Spanish king's bedroom. In early inventories, the painting was called The Garden Party.
Venus Consoling Love is an oil-on-canvas painting executed in 1751 by the French artist François Boucher. The painting depicts a mythological scene, where Venus, the goddess of Love, depicted as a charming and supple young woman, is impersonating the French Rococo's beauty ideals. She is about to disarm Cupid, by taking away his arrows, that he uses when shooting at people to make them fall in love.
"In Enlightenment France the dedicated search to define truth engendered a re–evaluation of the natural. The belief that it was right to follow nature, and that the pursuit of pleasure was natural, influenced the prevailing conception of the nude ...
Monna Vanna is an 1866 oil on canvas painting by Dante Gabriel Rossetti. It was acquired by the collector William Henry Blackmore and later entered the collection of George Rae, one of Rossetti's patrons. It later passed from Rae to the joint ownership of Arthur Du Cros and Otto Beit and it was purchased from them by the Tate Gallery in 1916 via the NACF – it is now in the collection of Tate Britain in London.
The magical Girdle of Aphrodite or Venus, variously interpreted as girdle, belt, breast-band, and otherwise, is one of the erotic accessories of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty. According to Homer, the girdle was imbued with the power to inspire the passion of desire in mortals and immortals alike. Hera, in her role as the goddess of marriage, sometimes borrowed it from Aphrodite to mitigate lovers' quarrels, to instigate the bridal contests of suitors, and on at least one occasion to manipulate her husband Zeus.
