23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

Artwork of the week

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Love and Chastity

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/g
herardo-giovanni-del-fora-the-combat-of-love-and-
chastity-1475-1500.jpg)

This week’s post is about various paintings related to The

Combat of Love and Chastity by Gherardo di Giovanni
del Fora
(http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/gherardo-
di-giovanni-del-fora-the-combat-of-love-and-chastity). It
can be found in the National Gallery and was painted in
the late 15th century. A number of different
considerations led me to writing on this subject this week:

1) I haven’t written very much about Italian Renaissance

paintings on the blog. Partly this is because my favourite
art is British and from the period of about 1910 to 1960,
rather than Italian Renaissance. Partly it’s because I’ve
only studied Renaissance art at a relatively high level
generally, albeit with some detailed focus on individual
artists (Botticelli and Simone Martini in particular) so it
doesn’t immediately pop into my head as a subject every
week. Anyway, I thought this week would be a good
week to focus on this area.
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23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

2) When reading up on David Inshaw for a couple of

earlier posts (https://wordpress.com/post/78122115/214/),
I came across the David Inshaw website, which had a very
good section about his painting The Badminton Game
(http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/inshaw-the-
badminton-game-t03189). It quoted Inshaw as being
influenced by The Combat of Love and Chastity.

3) On a recent London visit, there was a strike taking place

so that many of the gallery staff were not working. This
meant they closed off most of the galleries to the public,
but they remained open to the public and kept open the
Renaissance galleries. I hadn’t been through these for a
while and thought I would make the most of it. As I did
so, I had The Combat of Love and Chastity in my mind
because of the Inshaw painting and therefore made sure
to have a good close look at it.

4) While thinking about how The Combat of Love and

Chastity influenced Inshaw’s painting, I thought it might
be cool to try and find other paintings influence by or
related to the Gherardo work or the subject it’s
representing.

So that’s what this week’s post ended up being about –

various paintings related to Gherardo’s painting about
Love and Chastity.

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Firstly, it may be worth saying where the subject matter

comes from – a cycle of poems from about 1370 by Francis
Petrarch called The Triumphs. These poems describe a
series of mythological figures triumphing over each other
in sequence i.e. Love (as in physical love – lust) is defeated
by Chastity, which is defeated by Death, which is defeated
by Fame, which is defeated by Time, which is defeated by
Eternity. For this post I was mainly trying to find
paintings which focussed on the first battle – Love and
Chastity – although I have come up with a couple that
show more than one battle.

So, the first painting is the headline one by Gherardo di

Giovanni del Fora. This is quite a small painting (42.5 x
34.9 cm) and quite easy to miss as you stride through the
National Gallery being awed by the huge masterpieces all
around. Very delicate in real life (more so than
in reproduction, I think), the gently rolling hills and
realistic vegetation make the background look almost like
an English countryside. Having seen the painting, it’s
influence on David Inshaw’s The Badminton Game now
seems obvious. The shuttlecock in the Inshaw painting
obviously parallel the arrows flying (very gently) between
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23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

Love and Chastity in the Gherardo painting. Incidentally,

don’t miss the 2 swans in the background, probably
symbols of purity (i.e. the victory of Chastity).

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/i
nshaw-the-badminton-game-1972-731.jpg)

Inshaw’s painting is not, strictly, depicting the subject of

the Petrarch poem. However, as stated earlier, he was
influenced by the Gherardo work as per this quote,
“‘While I was making the drawings for this picture, I had
in mind a favourite picture at the National Gallery in
London called The Combat of Love and Chastity
[Gherardo di Giovanni del Fora, circa 1475-1500] which I
have loved for many years. It has, to my mind, the quality
I was seeking to bring to my own work.” The excellent
David Inshaw website
(http://www.davidinshaw.net/04.html) has more detail
and longer quotes.

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/p
ietro-perugino-battle-of-love-and-chastity-1505.jpg)

Going back to the Petrarch poem, probably the most

famous depiction of the subject in any painting is
Perugino’s Battle of Love and Chastity (http://expo-
leperugin.com/en/battle-love-and-chastity/?theme=1) in
the Louvre. This was painted in 1505 for the renowned
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Renaissance patron Isabelle D’Este, the Marchioness of

Mantua. It was painted for her studiolo (effectively her
private museum) and when she received the painting she
was not entirely happy. Amusingly, she complained that it
would have been better painted in oil rather than
tempera, conveniently forgetting that she actually
instructed Perugino to paint it in tempera!

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/c
hristiana-jane-herringham-a-battle-of-love-and-chastity-
after-gherardo-1918.jpg)

This painting by Christiana Herringham is, as you can see,

an exact copy of the Gherardo painting. Herringham lived
from 1852 – 1929 and the work, which is in the Royal
Holloway Collection, was acquired in 1918, so
presumably was painted around that time. She appears to
have been an interesting character, establishing the
National Art Collections Fund in order to preserve
Britain’s artistic heritage, whilst copying Old Masters (like
this one) and dedicating herself to the revival of tempera
painting. The painting’s official title is A Battle of Love
and Chastity (after Gherardo di Giovanni del Fora)
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/a-
battle-of-love-and-chastity-12946).

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23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/l
uca-signorelli-the-triumph-of-chastity-love-disarmed-
and-bound-15091.jpg)

Here is another version of the subject from the National

Gallery, this one a fresco by Luca Signorelli from 1509. The
focus of this painting, The Triumph of Chastity: Love
Disarmed and Bound
(http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/luca-
signorelli-the-triumph-of-chastity-love-disarmed-and-
bound), is slightly different in that it shows the aftermath
of the battle rather than the battle itself.

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/f
rancesco-pesellino-the-triumphs-of-love-chastity-and-
death-1450.jpg)

Here is a very early version, from 1450, showing the first 3

triumphs. It is by Francesco Pesellino and reminds me a
little of Paolo Uccello’s work, with it’s very obvious,
almost forced, use of perspective (as with the horses and
cart to the right). The title is The Triumphs of Love,
Chastity, and Death
(http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection/browse?
filter=genre:3012) and it comes from the Isabella Stewart
Gardner Museum.

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23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

(https://artworkoftheweek.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/f
ollower-of-mantegna-the-triumphs-of-love-chastity-and-
death-and-the-triumphs-of-fame-time-and-divinity-
about-1460s.jpg)

Finally, this version from the Denver Art Museum shows

all 6 triumphs, spread over 2 paintings. They are called
The Triumphs of Love, Chastity, and Death and The
Triumphs of Fame, Time, and Divinity
(http://creativity.denverartmuseum.org/1961_169_1/) and
are by a follower of Mantegna from about the 1460s.

Hope you enjoyed this quick canter through a bunch of

“Love and Chastity” related paintings. In hindsight I
should have done this last week…for Valentine’s day…
but never mind! Maybe next year!

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FEBRUARY 22, 2015FEBRUARY 22, 2015 STEVE
JONES PAINTINGS ART, CHRISTIANA
HERRINGHAM, DAVID INSHAW, FRANCESCO
PESELLINO, GHERARDO DI GIOVANNI DEL FORA,
LOVE AND CHASTITY, LUCA SIGNORELLI,
MANTEGNA, PERUGINO, PETRARCH

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23/10/2019 Love and Chastity – Artwork of the week

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