Botticelli Paints Primavera

1478

In a Medici villa workroom, Sandro Botticelli completed a vast allegory of Venus, Mercury, the Three Graces, and Flora scattering roses across a spring meadow. It was pagan, philosophical, and quietly erotic. The painting, commissioned by a young Medici cousin, hangs now in the Uffizi still smelling faintly of Tuscan flowers.