This is a picture of a volcano (named Gula Mons) on the surface of Venus. It is not a photograph: Venus' atmosphere is opaque to normal light, and the surface is too hot for landers to survive long. Instead, an orbiting spacecraft used radar to give us an idea of what the surface looks like, than a computer was used to draw this image using that information.
Radar doesn't tell us anything about the color of the ground, though. The color for this picture was selected based on what a Russian space probe saw during its very brief life on the surface.
Venus is the second planet from the sun, which makes it warmer than the Earth. It's atmosphere is composed of carbon dioxide, which traps the sun's energy in the so-called "greenhouse effect", making Venus the hottest planet in the solar system.
PtyS 106 is the course that talks the most about Venus.
PtyS 403, PtyS 407, and PtyS 411 also partly deal with Venus.
Some other places you can find information on Venus include:
