Pygmalion and Galatea

This panel was never meant to be seen on its own. It was made as a cover, a lid that slid across the front of a portrait, both to protect it and to hint at what lay behind. Painted covers like this rarely survive, and this one shielded Pontormo's portrait of a young halberdier. The scene is the old myth of Pygmalion, the sculptor who carves a woman so beautiful that he falls in love with the marble and begs Venus to make her real. Here she steps down from her pedestal, still pale, drawing her first breath, while he kneels at an altar. Bronzino was in his mid twenties when he painted it, around 1529, the year Florence was under siege by imperial armies. Worked into the picture is a small inscription to the effect that Venus has won, love winning out over cold stone.