Venus Statue

Forget the Venus de Milo. Adelaide has our own Venus and she’s on North Terrace right in front of Government House. Venus was Adelaide’s very first statue and she was donated to the city by William Austin Horn, an early mining tycoon.
Unveiled (no pun intended) back in 1892, our Venus is a copy of Antonio Canova’s Venus. Conova was an Italian sculptor who specialised in nudes and needless to say the erection of this statue caused quite the stir in conservative little Adelaide. By today’s standards of course, Venus is quite tame and she’s simply showing is one breast (Janet Jackson style).
It is interesting to note the depiction of the three female statues in close proximity on North Terrace. There’s a partly naked women, Venus (unveiled 1892), Mary Lee, Suffragette unveiled 1994 and Dame Roma Mitchell, Governor of the state, unveiled 1999. My how those times have changed.