Venus & Mars

The Vivienne Westwood bag is the material incarnation of the goddess Venus, from Botticelli’s
‘Venus and Mars,’ tempera, 1483, replacing the Greek goddesses of love with a forest vanitas
still life and signifiers of a young woman in courtship. The juxtaposition of the artificial and
natural world is something which brings the artist closer to her roots growing up in the Dorset
countryside. ‘I like the idea of the forest animals getting their hands on the contents of someone’s handbag in Chelsea, besides nonmatter who we are in life we all go back to nature eventually, maybe it’s a sort of memento mori.’