Charles, Camilla and new Botticelli

Twenty years ago, he gazed admiringly at Botticelli's famous painting, The Birth Of Venus, during a visit to Italy with his young wife, Diana.

The royal couple - the princess in a white outfit with bow tie, Charles craning forward for a better look - studied the nearly naked goddess of love stepping from her seashell when they visited the Uffizi gallery in Florence, in 1985.

Now, Charles has been reminded in the most unpleasant way, of Botticelli's allegorical work - by a mischievous artist. In the new work it is Diana who emerges from the sea, her head seamlessly grafted on to that of Venus. And the Zephyrs, the symbols of spiritual passion which blow the shell toward land, have been replaced by Charles and Camilla.

Only the heads have been replaced in this work, commissioned by a London artist and gallery owner. So Diana still shields her nether regions with her left hand and covers her breasts with her right, although her expression is rather less dreamy than that of Venus - perhaps an allusion to her troubled life.

Charles and Camilla, meanwhile, seem to be having a proper giggle as they puff out their cheeks and blow. Camilla, her hair a rich auburn, smiles broadly as a tanned Charles acts out the role of chief Zephyr, blowing until he is red in the face.

To Diana's left, one of the Ores - goddesses of the seasons - hands her a floral-patterned cloak as she prepares to step on to land.

Except that in The Venus Conspiracy it is not a goddess, it is the Queen attempting to preserve Diana's modesty. And perhaps unsurprisingly, considering Diana's relationship with the House of Windsor, the monarch looks a little annoyed as she performs her symbolic role.

Off to the side of the frame, and out of our picture is Dodi Fayed, in a red robe and leather sandals, as a figure "borrowed" from another Botticelli painting, the Primavera.

The project was dreamed up by Terry Duffy, a contemporary artist who runs 340 Old Street, a gallery in Shoreditch where the painting is now on display.

"I hope this painting will help people question what each of these people has done, and is doing, and how they might inter-relate," he said. "By simply changing the faces, the work is transformed from ancient myth to a contemporary reality of lies, deceit, adultery and death - with allegations of murder. It's amazing what a painting can say."

The canvas, which measures 80in by 40in (considerably smaller than the original) was painted by another artist, Bob Goldsborough. It is part of a series called Allegory, in which the heads of contemporary figures are grafted on to famous paintings. One, from Pieter Brueghel's Parable Of The Blind Leading The Blind, shows Tony Blair leading George Bush, Vladimir Putin and Kofi Annan.