The Story of Lucretia
Sandro Botticelli·1500
Historical Context
The Story of Lucretia from circa 1500 at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum depicts the Roman legend of the noblewoman raped by Sextus Tarquinius who chose death over dishonor, her suicide triggering the revolt that overthrew the Tarquin monarchy and established the Roman Republic. The subject was a standard humanist example of female virtue and the origins of republican freedom. Painted in Botticelli's final period, the work shows his characteristic late combination of narrative clarity and formal gravity. The Gardner Museum, assembled by Isabella Stewart Gardner from her Boston mansion, holds among the finest concentrations of early Italian painting in North America, and this late Botticelli is among its most significant holdings.
Technical Analysis
The narrative unfolds across a complex architectural stage, Botticelli's angular late drawing style lending dramatic tension to the scenes of violation and political upheaval that the Lucretia story encompasses.
