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Joachim Wtewael belong to the same generation as the Haarlem Mannerists. He was in Italy from about 1588 to 1590; he lived in Padua, close enough to Venice to become familiar with the Venetian masters. He also studied works by Correggio and the Tuscan Mannerist Jacopo Zucchi. He returned to the Netherlands and by 1592 he had settled in Utrecht. He painted portraits and kitchen scenes as well as subject pictures. His religious and allegorical pieces are frequently cabinet-size on copper supports and are characterized by masterly drawn, highly polished figures often set in capricious poses. He painted in metallic colours and had a predilection for vivid yellow, intense reds, deep greens, and browns. When well preserved his little pictures glow like gems. One of them is the Mars and Venus Discovered by the Gods.
This painting has an Ovidian theme. The gods burst out in Homeric laughter as they witness Mars and Venus strapped stark naked by Vulcan, Venus's cuckolded husband (in the right foreground). His forge is glimpsed behind. Hovering in mid-air, Cupid and Apollo lift the bed curtain to afford the gods, and us, a peek at the adulterous couple.
The Mannerist mode was not only about such stylish wit, however. The story of Mars and Venus, however hilariously rendered, offered an embarrassing example of the disastrous consequences of adultery.
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