Credits

• Portrait photography by Patrick Lentz
• Concept, design, illustration, and additional photography by Yanko Tsvetkov
• Model: Michael
• Equipment: Nikon D200
• Software: Photoshop, Illustrator

©2007 by AlphaDesigner/Patrick Lentz. All rights reserved.

Web Links

• Theogony set on Flickr
• Atlas on Wikipedia
• Atlas on Encyclopedia Mythica
• Blog post on AlphaDesigner Blogue

Case Study

More in the Behind the Scenes set on Flickr.

Review

If Prometeus was the titan that loved humankind more than he loved the heavens, his brother Atlas went one step further - he became a metaphor for human nature. We all carry our own heavens on our shoulders - filled with dreams, ideals and expectations. We all are very careful not to let them crumble and fall down. The stark separation between sky and earth in the Christian doctrines even took us further in our quest for pursuit of the ultimate schizophrenia. The pleasures of the soul and the pleasure of the body became opposites. However, in pagan myths they are not enemies but complimet each other. I guess it's really time for our Atlas to shrug.

Wikipedia

Atlas, along with his brother Menoetius, sided with the Titans in their war against the Olympians, the Titanomachy. His brothers Prometheus and Epimetheus weighed the odds and betrayed the other Titans by forming an alliance with the Olympians. When the Titans were defeated , many of them... were confined to Tartarus, but Zeus condemned Atlas to stand at the western edge of the Gaia, the Earth and hold up Ouranos, the Sky on his shoulders...

See Wikipedia, Atlas (mythology), (as of Feb. 29, 2008).

Final Artwork

• Atlas Shrugged on Flickr