I Modi  

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I Modi (The Ways, also known as The 16 Pleasures) is a famous, essentially lost erotic book of the Italian Renaissance by Italians Pietro Aretino and Marcantonio Raimondi. It is an illustrated book of 16 "postures" or sexual positions. Raimondi had published the I Modi once before, and was subsequently imprisoned by the Pope Clement VII and all copies of the illustrations were destroyed. Raimondi based the engravings on a series of erotic paintings that Giulio Romano was doing as a commission for the Palazzo del Te in Mantua. Though the two depictions were very similar, only Raimondi was prosecuted because his engravings were capable of being seen by the public. Romano did not know of the engravings until Aretino came to see the original paintings while Romano was still working on them. Aretino then composed sixteen explicit sonnets ("both in your pussy and your behind, my cock will make me happy, and you happy and blissful") to go with the paintings and secured Raimondi's release from prison. The I Modi was then published a second time, with the poems and the pictures, making this the first time erotic text and images were combined, though the papacy once more seized all the copies it could find. Raimondi escaped prison that time, but the censorship was so complete that no original copies have ever been found. The text in existence is only a copy of a copy that was discovered 400 years later.

Classical guise

Several factors were used to cloak these engravings in classical scholarly respectability:

• the images nominally depicted famous pairings of lovers (eg Antony and Cleopatra) or husband-and-wife deities (eg Jupiter and Juno) from classical history and mythology engaged in sexual activity, and were entitled as such. Related to this were:
  • Portraying them with their usual attributes, such as:
    • Cleopatra's banquets, bottom left
    • Achilles's shield and helmet, bottom left
    • Hercules in his lion-skin and club
    • Mars with his cuirass
    • Paris as a shepherd
    • Bacchus with his vine-leaf crown and (bottom right) grapes
  • Referring to the best known myths or historical events in which they appeared eg:
    • Mars and Venus under the net which her husband Vulcan has designed to catch them
    • 'Aeneas' and 'Dido' in the cave in which their sexual intercourse is alluded in Aeneid, Book 4
    • Theseus abandoning Ariadne on Naxos, where Bacchus finds and marries her.
    • the wide adultery of Julia
    • Messalina's participation in prostitution, as criticised in Juvenal's Satire VI.
  • Referring to other Renaissance and classical tropes in the depiction of these people and deities, such as
    • The contrast between Mars's dark hair and tanned skin and his partner Venus's untanned, fair skin and fair or even blonde hair.
    • Jupiter's full beard
• the frontispiece image is entitled Venus Genetrix,<ref>An attested epithet of the love/lust goddess Venus, although under that name she was more a mother goddess than a love/lust goddess.</ref> and the goddess is nude and drawn in a chariot by doves, as in the classical sources.
• the bodies of those depicted show clear influences from classical statuary known at the time, such as:
  • the over-muscled torsos and backs of the men (drawn from sculptures such as the Laocoön and his Sons, Belvedere Torso, and Farnese Hercules).
  • the women's clearly defined though small breasts (drawn from examples such as the Venus de' Medici and Aphrodite of Cnidus)
  • the elaborate hairstyles of some of the women, such as his Venus, Juno or Cleopatra (derived from Roman Imperial era busts such as this one).
• Portraying the action in a classical 'stage set' such as an ancient Greek sanctuary or temple.
• The large erect penis on the statue of Priapus or Pan atop a puteal in 'The Cult of Priapus' is derived from examples in classical sculpture and painting (like this fresco, this sarcophagus and this statuette) which were beginning to be found archaeologically at this time.

Differences from antique art

The work has various points of deviation from classical literature, erotica, mythology and art which suggest its classical learning is lightly worn, and make clear its actual modern setting:

• the male sexual partners' large penises (though not Priapus's) are the artist's invention rather than a classical borrowing - the idealised penis in classical art was small, not large (large penises were seen as comic or fertility symbols, as for example on Priapus, as discussed above).
• The title 'Polyenus and Chryseis' pairs the fictional Polyenus with the actual mythological character Chryseis.
• The title 'Alcibiades and Glycera' pairs two historical figures from different periods - the 5th century BC Alcibiades and the 4th century BC Glycera
• Female satyrs did not occur in classical mythology, yet they appear twice in this work (in 'The Satyr and his wife' and 'The Cult of Priapus').<ref>Male satyrs having sex with nymphs, on the other hand, did appear in Greek myth - as has been taken up in Renaissance art - , though this was more frequently rape in the myths rather than the apparent consensual sex in the engraving.</ref>
• All the women and goddesses in this work (but most clearly its Venus Genetrix) have a hairless groin (like classical statuary of nude females) but also a clearly apparent vulva (unlike classical statuary).
• the modern furniture, eg
  • the various stools and cushions used to support the participants or otherwise raise them into the right positions (eg here)
  • the other sex aids (eg a whip, bottom right)
  • the 16th century beds, with ornate curtains, carvings, taselled cushions, bedposts, etc.