Flowers became an inseparable part of the arts of the mankind starting from the time of its "golden childhood" - antiquity. Flower festivals were held in Ancient Rome in honour of goddess Flora and women used to compete in running and wrestling accompanied by the sounds of horns and kettle-drums. The winners were strewn with flowers and awarded with wreaths. Rose was a sacred flower of Venus, her attribute in the Renaissance and later. The Renaissance associated rose and Venus because of the beauty and odour of this flower and compared scratches of the rose thorns with the wounds of love. In Christian symbolism rose also obtained special importance: red rose symbolises blood of a martyr, white rose is a symbol of purity of the Virgin who was otherwise called a "rose without thorns". Lily in Christian art also symbolises purity of the Virgin. Archangel Gabriel hands a lily to Madonna in the scene of the Annunciation. Numerous flowers fill in the background of "millefiori" tapestries commemorating the festivals of the Holy Body of Christ when European towns were buried in flowers.

In the stil lifes of the 17th century flowers played the main role reminding about perishable nature of the world and brevity of pleasures as short as the life of a flower.

The gallantry age, the 18th century, in Europe considered flowers as decorative elements of life. They were everywhere - in the decor of interiors, painted panels, costumes and accessoirs. Taking gelight in contemplating flowers was a source of refined pleasures in the Eastern countries. Flowers decorated ceramics, fabrics and works of calligraphic art there. Miscellaneous forms and colours of flowers could not fail to attract artists of new trends of art in the 19th-20th centuries. Flowers became an inexhaustible source for creative experiments.

Flora
Tenerani Pietro
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Vase of Flowers
Mignon, Abraham
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Sunflowers
Gauguin Paul
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The Annunciation
Cima da Conegliano
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The Madonna and Child
Antonio da Firenze
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Venus Consoling Cupid Stung by a Bee
West, Benjamin
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The Crucifixion with the Virgin and St John and
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