A young woman stands in the sea, wringing out her long reddish hair with both hands, her gaze turned to the side. A scallop shell lies half-submerged at the lower left, and the sea meets a pale blue sky at a low horizon. The subject is Venus rising from the sea, known as Venus Anadyomene. The National Galleries of Scotland link it to Apelles, the leading painter of antiquity, who made a picture of the subject, and say Titian invites comparison with him.

Titian painted this small canvas, about 76 by 58 centimeters, around 1520. It belonged to the Bridgewater collection of the Dukes of Sutherland, which was placed on loan to the National Gallery of Scotland in 1945. The gallery acquired the painting in 2003 from the Trustees of the 7th Duke of Sutherland, partly in lieu of inheritance tax, with help from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Art Fund and the Scottish Executive. It is in the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh.