Greta Christina has been writing professionally since 1989, on topics including atheism, sexuality and sex-positivity, LGBT issues, politics, culture, and whatever crosses her mind. She is author of
The Way of the Heathen: Practicing Atheism in Everyday Life, of
Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, of
Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, of
Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and of
Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More, and is editor of
Paying For It: A Guide by Sex Workers for Their Clients. She has been a public speaker for many years, and many of her talks can be seen on YouTube. Her writing has appeared in multiple magazines and newspapers, including Ms., Penthouse, Chicago Sun-Times, On Our Backs, and Skeptical Inquirer, and numerous anthologies, including
Everything You Know About God Is Wrong and three volumes of
Best American Erotica. (Any views she expresses in this blog are solely hers, and do not necessarily represent this organizations.) She lives in San Francisco with her wife, Ingrid. You can email her at gretachristina (at) gmail (dot) com, or follow her on
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Well to be fair, babies are ugly.
The first one looks a bit like George Arliss but then, my daughter looked like Charles Laughton when she was born.
Actually, the correct plural is “babies Jesus.”
kft @ #3: I am totally using that from now on.
Part of the problem is that they give baby Jesus too grown up of a face. I wonder if that was a problematic convention with depictions of children in general, or if they were trying to sell Jesus as “wise beyond his years”.
And, I’m no anatomist, but Mary’s breast in that last one seems a bit to high and close to the sternum.
That could be a result of whatever caused the Middle Eastern Jewish woman to look Northern European.
I have reverence for the effect of painting subjects (like babies) without bothering to actual LOOK at any.
I don’t like babies, but I’ve never been tempted to pop a boil in the face of one.
I suspect that, because so much of the art produced in the renaissance was done on commission, that what we are seeing are iconic figures being depicted as resembling the person or family of the person that commissioned the art. I lack the patience, and knowledge of art, but it shouldn’t be too difficult to figure out who commissioned the pieces and compare them to any depictions you can find.
The angel in the second one does not approve. Is it because Mary is letting Jesus at the candy bowl? Or has he just noticed Mary’s mutant hands?
@9
Yeah. No. 1 in particular is clearly the face of an adult. And I would bet money that it at least superficially resembles the patron or the person the patron was sucking up to by commissioning the painting.
To me, the third one looks like Rodney Dangerfield. But probably gets more respect.
Moggie@10,
Yes, I noticed that. I think Jesus is surreptitiously grabbing a sweet while pretending to be absorbed in the book, and the angel is going t oslap his hand.