Three nonillustrative faces: The Three Faces Of Eve

The one on the left is sexy, and the one in the middle is the child?

Yeah, those three aren't clear at all. I'm seeing a lot of sexy and no child.

Do you mean stage left? No the one wearing armor is Athena, definitely protective/motherly. Middle is Hera, who is kind of childish in that she pitches fits. Right (with flower in her hair and dove on shoulder) is Aphrodite the goddess of love. That is all with context tho, don't think I can evaluate without very well.

That scene has been represented very many times, tho, might be a good avenue to pursue. The current image is okay also.

edited 25th Jan '12 8:39:11 PM by rodneyAnonymous

I really don't see how the goddesses are any clearer than the current image.

Hera is also associated with sex and romance and her biggest fits are because Aphrodite upstages her as a bigger slut.

Almost every other pic of that scene I found in GIS was NSFW due to nudity...I know that classic artworks don't technically fall under that for our purposes, but I'm still not comfortable with using them. Also, they were even worse for demonstrating the trope...kinda hard to get the roles across with three naked chicks in basically the same pose.

edited 25th Jan '12 8:42:48 PM by Willbyr

Yeah Hera is the weakest one. Athena tends to look matronly and Aphrodite tends to look like a seductress.

I assumed I got it wrong, since I knew Athena isn't supposed to be a seductress.

Still, she's the one lifting her dress and showing off her leg. In that picture, she's the sexy one.

Just throwing this one out here, even though it's too risqué even for our "artistic nudity is OK" policy:

The three stages of woman, plus a bonus guy◊ (Artist is Edward Munch.)

I thought that Athena is the child (one of the few virginal godesses)and Hera the wife. If we want to use this scene I think this image is quite good. [1]◊ Aphrodite is confident in her sexuality, Athena is covering herself and Hera is fully clothed and has a confident stance while putting her hand comforting of Athenas shoulder.

edited 26th Jan '12 1:47:39 AM by Osmium

he last few posts are a very good indication that the three godesses is not a good illustration of the trio. The three roles have been assigned, from left to right, as being variously:

wife; child; seductress

child; wife;seductress

and

seductress; child; wife

Which means that this image does not clearly illustrate the archetypes.

Additionally if you know the goddesses it's even worse, since Hera is the symbol of hearth and home, while Athena is knowledge and wisdom.

Ah My Goddess is another show that uses this motif heavily.

Not great but found in a minute on google image search◊ We could probably find a better one.

I don't know, I think we might need to create our own image. particularly if we want non anime.

I thought the Gilligan's Island ladies got it pretty well.

No, they do The Hecate Sisters well. There's no crone in this one.

Hecate Sisters involves age as well. And while Mrs Howell is the oldest, shes not the wisest or most cynical — and that's the Crone role in The Hecate Sisters.

What's interesting about the Gilligan's Island one is that all three Faces Of Eve are there. But Mrs Howell is the oldest chronologically and still fills the "Child" role — she's naive, pretty much nonsexual, and dependent. It's Mary Ann that's the Wife; sensible, stable, and reliable.

So for me, the question about using tyhat image is this: how many people are going to assume that Mrs Howell and Mary Ann fill the wrong roles and thus keep on misusing the trope?

You're right. I was going on appearances, not the actual characters for the Gilligan's thing.

So we need a wise woman, a vamp, and girl-child.

Not so much wise as sensible. Wise implies age where that's not really a factor here. Sensible and practical is really more what the wife embodies.

We also want to avoid any images that show a very young woman, a middlish woman, and an old woman. Confusion with The Hecate Sisters is a real thing.

edited 26th Jan '12 9:42:09 AM by shimaspawn

Had a go at it, but wasn't really sure how to express the sensible face. [1]

Typed in Oh My Goddess and got these, 1◊, 2◊, 3◊, 4◊, 5◊.

^ All anime.

First one's pretty good. Number five is broken, redirects to some football site.

Actually, you know what'd also make a great pic? One of the same woman playing each role.

edited 3rd Feb '12 10:34:36 PM by evilneko

The first one's quite suitable, it gets the meaning of the trope across pretty well and it displays the attitudes of the three faces fairly well.

Here's another link for 5 for those that can't see it.◊

My picks would be this one or 2 although 1 is also good.

edited 3rd Feb '12 11:28:33 PM by doomrider7

Aw c'mon, man, you're gonna bring that up even on something as hard to find a picture of as this?

Not that I even think those pictures are very good, but, c'mon, priorities?

I don't see much motherly in any of those, but that just might be me.