In this artwork, how is the Critical reception discussed?
Well known art critic and long-time supporter of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood John Ruskin strongly objected to the sexual tone and imagery in this painting. As Rossetti moved away from his early, more conventional Pre-Raphaelite style, his work began to clash with Ruskin's conservative nature.  Letters between the two colleagues and friends indicate their falling out, and Ruskin's concerns with the imagery in Venus Verticordia after seeing it in Rossetti's artist studio.
"I purposely used the word ‘wonderfully’ painted about those flowers. They were wonderful to me, in their realism; awful – I can use no other word – in their coarseness.”–Excerpt of a letter to Rossetti from John Ruskin, 1865
John Ruskin Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood Venus Verticordia Venus