Pietro Liberi

Pietro Liberi trained with Alessandro Varotari, called il Padovanino (1588–1649), and travelled fairly extensively around Europe and Italy before returning to Venice, where he spent most of his career. His artistic output, which included numerous frescoes, was prolific and varied, but he enjoyed perhaps most success with mythological scenes, which were highly sought after by his aristocratic patrons in Venice, as well as the Imperial Court, following his trip to Austria, Hungary and Bohemia in 1658–59.

Recalling Venetian precedents of the sixteenth century, this later work is typical of the artist's rendering of female figures. Imbued with sensual and erotic overtones, the soft modulations of tone and colouring anticipates the art of the next century.