Venus is reclining naked on a blue-grey cloth, with her head on the right and Cupid embracing her from behind. As he kisses her she removes an arrow from his quiver. On the left is a square pedestal with an urn of roses on top, from which hangs a bow and two masks. Inside the box-table is a statuette on its back. Left of the centre is a distant, hilly landscape. The composition can be understood as an allegory of the power of beauty to disarm love, although it is somewhat ambiguous; as Venus steals Cupid’s arrow she seems about to be wounded herself by the other arrows sliding from his quiver.

The painting is one of a very large number of copies after a design by Michaelangelo. The original painting was made after Michaelangelo’s cartoon by Pontormo, as a centerpiece for the ‘camera’ in the house of Michaelangelo’s friend Bartolomeo Bettini. This panel is now in the Accademia Florence. Michaelangelo’s drawings and cartoon appear to have been made in 1532. Vasari made two or perhaps three copies, according to his account, and it is likely that this work was one of these.