The Origin of the Milky Way by Tintoretto (1575 - 1580)

I fucking love this painting.

I love it with a fiery passion, that if it were a real person, I would probably get down on one knee and propose to it with tears in my eyes and unattractive snot running from my nose.

So let’s stop and think about how pretty of a painting it is. And then let’s consider how utterly ridiculous it looks as well. I’d like to think that it won’t just be me that will find amusement from the mere sight of this painting, so I’m going to give you the basic laydown of what the fuck is going on.

So basically, you get a little mythology lesson as well. Now, maybe I’m not 100% accurate because I’m doing most of this from memory from an art book I read in a library like three months ago — but that’s irrelevant. Anyway. So what happens is Zeus, you know, god of the sky, thunder, lightning, law, order, justice, fun stuff like that — gets a mortal woman named Alcmene pregnant.

Not just any mortal woman though, she is like the PRIME CUT of mortals, apparently. Now, Alcmene has a husband, but that’s another story arc in which Zeus is a BAG OF DICKS. 

Anyway, they have a baby — and Zeus continues to be a TOTAL DICK about this because ZEUS IS THE BIGGEST DICK, OKAY? JUST. A GARGANTUAN DICK. He wants his kid to be IMMORTAL, y’see? And this kid’s name? It’s Hercules.

Ringing any bells?

(Disney totally botched up his story, but a tear comes to my eye every time ‘Go the Distance’ plays, so I’m not complaining.)

Anyway, Zeus wants Hercules to be immortal — and to be immortal, he needs to have some of Hera’s breast milk or something??? I don’t know — but of course, Hera’s like UH, HOW ABOUT NO. YOUR CHOICE TO SLEEP WITH A MORTAL WOMAN. WHY DON’T YOU ASK HER TO FEED YOUR CHILD. OH? HER BREAST MILK WON’T MAKE HIM IMMORTAL? WELL SUCKS FOR YOU. — I REFUSE TO LET HIM SUCKLE ON MY GODLY TITS — because she’s pissed that he’s sleeping around with mortal women and shit. And Zeus ain’t havin’ none o’dat, y’hear??? 

So, what does this DICK do? He brings that baby!Hercules to Hera when she’s sleeping. And he shoves baby!Hercules’ face in front of that goddess nipple and whispers/crows ‘OH YEAH HERCULES GO ON LET’S GET YOU SOME IM-MOR-TA-LI-TYYYYY’ Okay, I doubt he did that — but it’s great fun to think he did. And Hercules is still a total bab so he’s got NO FUCKIN’ CLUE WHAT’S GOING ON — or I don’t think he does, but I can’t tell how old he’s supposed to be in this painting/in the myth when this happens. But anyway, there’s a NIP and he’s a BABY/TODDLER/WHATEVER so WELP he latches right on. 

This is where the painting starts to come in.

Because this breast milk is making Hercules some kind of ~*SUPERBOY*~, Hercules starts to suck too hard on Hera’s nip and SHE WAKES THE FUCK UP. 

Let’s stop, because I want you to think about how you’d react if you woke up in the middle of the night because your nipple was hurting and realised your DICK OF A HUSBAND has the baby of another woman SUCKIN’ ON YOUR GODDAMN TIT. 

So Hera does what most of us would’ve done, and PULLS THE FUCK AWAY. JUST. YANKS HER NIPPLE RIGHT OUT OF THAT BABY’S MOUTH MID-SUCK. Seriously. Words cannot convey how wonderful this painting is — BECAUSE LOOK AT ALL THE SHIT GOING ON. Hera’s hand is out like ‘WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING’ and those angel cherub things are just floating around like they know SHIT IS GOING DOWN/WE WANT SOME O’ DAT/AW SHIT LOOK FREE BREAST MILK???? and there are ANIMALS that are SYMBOLIC FOR SOMETHING but I really don’t remember — it’s just HILARIOUS THAT THEY’RE THERE? THEY’RE JUST CHILLIN’. JUUUUST CHILLIN’. 

But my favorite, favorite part of this painting is thinking about how Hera’s goddamn fucking breast milk sprays out in some kind of sparkling shower like from an anime into the sky and BECOMES THE MILKY WAY. How many of YOUR moms can say that their breast milk became a GALAXY? What’s that? NONE OF THEM? THAT’S WHAT I THOUGHT. THAT IS INDEED WHAT I THOUGHT.