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ARTS SOCIETY PEWSEY VALE :: ‘THE CREATIVE COURTESAN’
28 January 2020 @ 7:00 pm - 11:59 pm
The Creative Courtesan:
The Art of High Class Prostitution
in Renaissance Italy
a talk by Sarah Dunant
Tuesday, 20 January 2020 at the Bouverie Hall, Pewsey
Doors open at 7.00pm for 7.30pm start
Guests welcome – £7 entry
[Titian: Venus of Urbano]
Titian’s Venus of Urbino is just one of a number of Renaissance
masterpieces that celebrate the beauty of the female form.
But who were the women who modelled for such paintings?
In an age where the church demanded celibacy
but turned a blind eye to chastity,
and where rich high class men married late
to virginal women they were not expected to be faithful to,
where did all that male desire go?
The answer, in cities like Rome and Venice,
was the birth of courtesan culture:
women as cultured, clever and fashionable as they were lovely.
This lecture names and tells stories –
with wonderful images to match.