Customer Reviews

Goddesses in Art

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is an extraordinary collection of images from many different cultures and countries. We discover how the image of women has evolved, how different powers were attributed to the feminine, over time. It is a celebration of the feminine, reminding us visually of the ways in which different cultures, throughout the history of the human race, have worshipped and sometimes feared the feminine, associating it with life and healing, but also with death, war and demonic powers. We learn so much about a culture when we reflect on which aspects of the feminine they chose to worship. "Generator of all creation," she is also "destroyer of all creation"! I particularly enjoyed the beautiful chapter on the goddesses of wisdom.

This book is absolutely wonderful. It's great to see a book focused on the goddess in art. The photographs in the book are very well done.

This is a wonderful book. Graham is a lifetime student of spirituality who deeply understands what he studies -- and who is able to communicate that understanding in luminous words and images. "Goddesses in Art" is a book of enormous range, a tour of spiritual traditions through history and across the world. Graham reaffirms The Goddess (whose whole spectrum of possibilities fills these pages), but also underscores the ways in which goddesses intertwine with gods in most traditions to generate our world. For me, part of the fun of the book was to trace the ways these intertwinings are expressed, as in the Hindu view of "the [male] motionless transcendent and the [female] energy by which the transcendent moves through the material world." All who read "Goddesses in Art" will find favorite passages and images of their own, and (I think I can promise!) will be enriched in the finding.

This book is a collection of some of the most beautiful sacred art in the world, including many fine pieces from Asia and Africa with which the casual reader will be unfamiliar. This work covers Goddess images from prehistory to modern images of the feminine Divine from posters of Marlene Dietrich to works by many WOMEN artists (I count five from casual perusal of the plates). Dr. Graham's work centers on the *image* of the Goddess as presenting an important method of understanding Divinity separate from cultural influence and religious theology.

The size (length and breadth) of this book is good for showing artwork --- big enough to show detail, and the photos in the book are very well-taken. Such a standard in photography is commendable.

On the down side, this book is no "encyclopedia" of goddesses; it is not exhaustive in collection of pictures/photos of various cultures, but shows only the well-known ones.

I would give 5 stars for the pictures and 3 for coverage of the various goddesses. Hence 4 stars.

On the whole, it is a nice book and worth a place on your bookshelf.

I was somewhat disappointed because all the pictures are goddesses rendered by MEN. Apparently there aren't many renderings of goddesses by women out there, or more likely, the author didn't think the women artists were legit enough to be included? What is included is fine and you're probably familiar with lots of them.