The Return from War: Mars Disarmed by Venus

Amid the disarray of Vulcan’s forge, Venus leans into the embrace of her lover Mars, who is transfixed by her alluring gaze; she lifts the helmet from his head while mischievous putti play with his sword and shield, and the god of war, caught up in his attraction, forgets his military calling. Seventeenth-century viewers understood the subject as an allegory of Peace — but Rubens and Brueghel’s interpretation stresses the frailty of that peace, for weapons are still being hammered out at the burning hearth in the background, hinting that love’s conquest of war may be only temporary. The two painters, close colleagues who collaborated on some twenty-five canvases, here display each master’s genius: Rubens’s robust, sensuous figures and Brueghel’s intricate landscape and still-life passages. The painting is held in the J. Paul Getty Museum.