(Padua 1605–1687 Venice)
The punishment of Cupid,
oil on canvas, 148.5 x 201 cm, framed

Provenance:
Aristocratic collection, Lucca;
where acquired by the present owner

We are grateful to Bernard Aikema for confirming the attribution and for his help in cataloguing the present painting.

The present composition, which appears to be previously unpublished, is a significant addition the oeuvre of Pietro Liberi. It shows Venus punishing Eros, who turns his face to the onlooker, crying out loudly. Other amores are fleeing in dismay on the left. The style of the picture is typical of Pietro Liberi, whose Venetian Cinquecento roots, derived from Titian and Veronese, are recognizable as well an influence and awareness of 17th century Emilian painting. Liberi’s pictures are not easy to date, but Aikema has suggested that it appears that the present painting might date from the 1660s, which was Liberi’s most successful period.

Pietro Liberi, was arguably the most distinguished painter in 17th century Venice. He studied with Alessandro Varotari, il Padovanino and travelled from 1628 to 1638 took him to Constantinople, Tunis and several European countries. He was in Rome from 1638 to 1640 where he studied Michelangelo and Raphael as well as the works the Carracci, Pietro da Cortona and Guido Ren. His earliest known work, the Rape of the Sabines (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena), richly reflects this experience of Rome. On his return journey to Venice in 1643 he stopped in Bologna and may have seen works by Emilian artists, from Correggio to Reni, in Parma. Stylistically Liberi can been seen as a mediator between the Venetian painterly tradition and the Baroque style of central Italy. In 1658 he made a journey through Austria, Hungary and Bohemia, where he created numerous works for the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, who made him a Count Palatine and he returned to Venice in 1659. His son Marco Liberi (circa 1640 – after 1687) was an also a painter who specialised mainly in mythologic and historic cabinet paintings and although Pietro Liberi produced significant altarpieces and other religious works, his real strength lay in mythological and allegorical paintings, often with a sensual or even erotic content, such as the present painting.