A Pair of Lovers

A young couple sits in a shaded wood while a winged Cupid flies in to lower a wreath onto the man's head. Almost nothing else about the scene is settled. The woman holds a set of reed pipes, four joined together, the kind of instrument shepherds play, and one the painter seems to have invented. Her clothes tell another story, a fine linen chemise, a patterned silk dress and a crimson cloak of silk velvet, the wardrobe of a wealthy Venetian woman. Scholars have read the picture as a myth, as an allegory of love, or simply as an erotic image of a nymph and her lover, and the National Gallery leaves the question open. Paris Bordone painted it in Venice between 1555 and 1560, building up the colour in tiny strokes. The Gallery bought it in 1860.