The New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts hosts an exhibition of artworks that explore themes of the multifaceted relationship between nature, femininity, and creation as informed by the contemporary social climate.

Painting the Figure Now will show quality paintings that investigate the many ways we see the human figure today; contemporary approaches to portraiture, narrative, and any and all visualizations focusing on the human form in life, action, play, work and repose.

Throughout history, Venus has stood as the great archetype of love, beauty, enticement, seduction, sexuality, eroticism, fertility, desire and prosperity.  As the goddess of love, she was seen as having blessed the unions of mortals by taming and assimilating the male essence and blending it with the female.  As a fertility symbol, she was revered as the mother of the Roman people.  As a “changer of hearts,” she was seen as a transformative force that encouraged her followers to cherish their sexuality and celebrate it in the context of love, marriage and family…