Eric Bess

In this installment of 'Reaching Within: What Traditional Art Offers the Heart,' we examine what makes someone truly ...

In this installment of 'Our Herculean Tasks: Finding Wisdom in the 12 Labors,' we look at Hercules's third ...

Two figures, one historical and one fictional, help us see how great artistic creations require the aid of ...

In this part of the series, ‘Our Herculean Tasks,’ Hercules tackles the monster Hydra.

In this installment of 'Reaching Within,' we look into the symbolism found in Hans Memling's 'Allegory with a ...

In this installment of 'Reaching Within,' we explore Greek philosopher Plato's analogy of the cave and artist Jan ...

In this first installment of 'Our Herculean Tasks,' we explore how the hero Hercules defeated the Nemean lion, ...

In this installment of 'Reaching Within: What Traditional Art Offers the Heart,' we look the story and a ...

Have you ever looked around and thought to yourself that there’s so much evil that it seems like ...

We all love to see beautiful things. What would our lives be without beauty? Yet there’s always the ...

Our environment is filled with things that test our character. Sometimes, we successfully overcome these things, and other ...

John Milton was blind by the time he wrote "Paradise Lost" in 1667. Throughout the text, he occasionally ...

What is freedom? Is freedom the ability to do whatever we want whenever we want? Or is freedom ...

In a world that rewards being right, it's very difficult to not pursue and parrot answers. We even ...

Evil things are frightening to many of us unless we are experiencing them from a distance. Sometimes, it ...

Sometimes, we are bombarded with evil: Dark imagery, music, words, and so on, can find their way into ...

Our series “Illustrious Ideas and Illustrations: The Imagery of Gustav Doré” has shown the evil ways of Satan ...

Throughout our series “Illustrious ideas and illustrations: The imagery of Gustav Doré,” we’ve had the opportunity to take ...

In the last part of our extensive series “Illustrious Ideas and Illustrations: The Imagery of Gustav Doré,” we ...

During this holiday season of giving, many of us put up a Christmas tree. We decorate it with ...

In this series, we’ve focused on Gustav Doré’s illustrations for John Milton's 17th-century epic poem "Paradise Lost." So ...

In this next article, Satan has just finished rallying the rebel angels after they fell to hell. He calls ...

After Satan is cast out from heaven for competing with God, he and his army of rebel angels ...

John Milton began his tragic poem “Paradise Lost” by telling us of a great war in heaven. Wanting ...

Sometimes, life’s difficulties can overwhelm us and cause us to do things we wouldn’t normally do. The perceived ...

Who were the Greek Muses? Zeus, the thunderbolt-wielding king of the gods, and Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, ...

We’ve all heard the phrase “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” but what does this mean ...