La Primavera, Plato, Alchemy, Love, Flora and Venus in a garden grove with a flowery mead
La Primavera (Spring) was painted by Sandro Botticelli c1482 and is one of the worlds most popular paintings. It shows a playful group of young maidens, two males and one putti. They are in a garden grove of orange trees with a flowery mead beneath their feet. The charming scene is interpreted as an allegory of Neoplatonic and Alchemical love, according to the philosophy of Marsilio Ficino. Venus is the central figure, as she is in many garden scenes. The Zephyr on the on the right tries to rape Chloris but then transforms her into Flora (the goddess of flowers). Alchemists believed one must go through difficult times in the progress of the soul towards perfection, as base metals must go through fire to become gold. The garden represents the physical world and the painting was partly inspired by Ovids description of the arrival of Spring
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