Venus de Milo

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This is the Venus de Milo, an ancient and extremely famous Greek sculpture. It is one of the many famous works of art in the Louvre. The identity of the sculptor is unknown.

Just about every photograph of this sculpture in existence shows it from the front— everyone knows what that looks like. I therefore decided to show it from the back, which has the added advantage of showing the crowd that is invariably gathered in front of the sculpture. Here, the Venus de Milo silently regards her admirers, and they noisily gawk at her. This was taken in the evening, so the crowd was light. It's much larger during the day.

This sculpture is fairly lifelike, if you ignore the fact that it is made of stone, and if you overlook the rather outdated hair style of the model. I’d hardly call it the epitome of feminine beauty—real women are a thousand times prettier than any sculpture, no matter how well executed—but at least it is not as egregiously unrealistic as many other sculptures of women seem to be. This statue could almost pass for the real thing, if you squint a bit.

Nobody really knows where the arms originally were placed, since they were already missing when the statue was rediscovered.

The statue is seen here in a "temporary" location, where it has been for several years now. The normal location is a short distance away.

Click directly on the photo to see a larger version (twice this size). Photographed on August 1, 2008.