Check out the Venus Gallery just added to Galleries for a preview of works submitted for the book…

This project began through my interest in classical art, initially an acknowledgement and exploration of Venus as mother of female nudity in art. I wanted to examine the inescapable link between the story of Venus in art and the story of the female nude. It began as a personal project and grew. I approached some of England’s most celebrated privately owned stately homes for special access to photograph this unique series of images. Though these are well known important buildings in their own right the location of the shoots is wholly incidental; they act merely as a backdrop.

Through my photographs I hope to explore the reality of Venus as the tangible female form, as well as her aspirational and virtuous beauty. In an age obsessed and as none before with the pursuit of artificial beauty, I think it is important to evaluate our historical relationship with physical beauty. The ancient Greeks considered the beauty of physical attributes fundamentally linked to the soul. The nude for them was a means of affirming the belief in ultimate perfection and mathematical divine order. Even though these earliest of sculptures were conceived from life, the aim of the artist was to perfect and improve upon nature and so the quest for physical perfection is not a modern invention.