Francesco Albani was a much favoured pupil of Annibale Carracci. His success was partially due to mythological paintings such as The toilet of Venus (P1) and The judgement of Paris (P2), whose refined and lyrical view of nature helped disseminate the classical ideals of the Carracci`s landscapes.

Albani`s The judgement of Paris, c.1650-60, shows the shepherd prince admiring the beauty of three goddesses competing for the golden apple: Venus, in the centre, accompanied by a dove; Minerva, on the right, identified by her helmet and the weapons lying abandoned on the ground; and Juno, associated with the peacock. In the sky, Cupid hastens to fit an arrow to his bow. As in The toilet of Venus, Albani here eschews action in favour of a placid scene in which the mortal shepherd leans against a tree as he attempts to decide who should receive the apple. On the left, over a landscape enlivened with small waterfalls, we see a river deity, who may be Scamander, running through Mount Ida in the company of some nymphs.

Like The toilet of Venus, this one includes various putti, which some see as an indication of the influence of Titian`s Aldobrandini Bacchanals. The presence of these works in Rome from 1598 onwards certainly had a decisive influence on Albani and his contemporaries. The putti also echo Albani`s own life, however, as he had twelve children and, according to his principal biographer Carlo Cesare Malvasia, the artist actually hung them from the ceiling as models.

A copy of this painting at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid, has smaller figures and a less-developed landscape.

While this painting and The toilet of Venus are similar in size, they were probably not a pair. Both were at the Buen Retiro Palace, Madrid, and in 1762 were among the works in the Spanish Royal Collection that the prudish Charles III ordered to be destroyed because of their sensuality. The works` immolation was prevented by the Marquis of Esquilache and Anton Raphael Mengs, who greatly admired the classical paintings from Bologna and managed to have them moved to the so-called Casa de Rebeque, near Madrid`s Royal Palace, along with many other works by Titian, Rubens and others. In 1792 the paintings were requested by the Academia de San Fernando as models for the study of colour and were hung in the Sala del Colorido. In 1827 they were taken to the Sala Reservada (Private Room) at the Museo del Prado, which existed until 1838 (González, R.: Italian Masterpieces. From Spain`s Royal Court, Museo del Prado, 2014, pp. 112-114).