Cleopatra with the Asp

Cleopatra with the Asp in the Royal Collection, painted around 1630, depicts the Egyptian queen's death by snakebite. Reni's treatment of dying beautiful women combined classical subject matter with his signature luminous technique. Guido Reni's refined classicism and ethereal beauty made him one of the most celebrated painters in Europe during his lifetime, his graceful idealized figures expressing a spirituality that appealed equally to Counter-Reformation piety and aristocratic aesthetic sensibility.

The queen's pale, luminous beauty is heightened by the approaching death. Reni's smooth modeling and silvery palette create an image of tragic elegance that transcends the historical narrative.