Bas Uterwijk, Dutch artist, did something remarkable. He took a variety of artistic renditions of people who lived before the era of photography, including paintings, status, icons, and whatever else happens to be available. He fed those to an artificial intelligence program to see what emerged out of the combination and commonalities among them. The results are very striking. No one will be surprised that, however interesting the rendering of Vincent van Gogh might be, I was far more captivated by the way Jesus is depicted. You can see that image above.
Someone who shared the image on Facebook wondered whether the icon Christ Pantocrator of St. Catherine’s Monastery at Sinai was the or a main image used. When I saw it my first instinct was to wonder what the influences were, since I saw the image before I read about the artist’s method. Once I understood it, I too immediately began thinking of particular depictions of Jesus.
I am struck by the fact that, by allowing artificial intelligence to create a realistic human face based on some of our oldest […]
Has anyone watched “Messiah” on Netflix? It is done in an episode format that was not continued after the first season. The question seems to be if the Messiah appeared in modern times would we recognize him as such or see him as an extreme threat to our way of life. Of course we are not sure who he really is or what his motives are or who his god might be. In todays world of cultural correctness in all areas I’m surprised Netflix has not taken it down.
According to the Bible, Christ was a descendant by both parents of David, who is described as being “ruddy” that is, with a reddish tint to his skin. If there is any consistency to heredity, Christ would be similar since Jews didn’t usually marry outside of their religion in Biblical times. There were no Palestinians, Syrians, etc. in Judea, Galilee, etc. at that time. Christians do tend to paint Christ in their own image: For example, the curved Semitic nose traditionally depicted for all Jews has been replaced by a Greek or Germanic nose.
Kenneth —
It is always important to remember that the New Testament Bible accounts are not contemporaneous, but written almost a century after Jesus’ life, offering conflicting accounts of the same events.
Also, there is the very strange business that Joseph was supposedly not Jesus’ father, so his genetics don’t matter, and Mary somehow was reduced in social status from the highest nobility (King David) to being the wife of a common mendicant carpenter with no explanation as to how that dramatic social reduction occurred, or why.
“According to the bible…”. You can stop right there. The bible is a plagiarised copy of earlier myths.
There is no evidence that Jesus existed. It is ludicrous that someone would bother to create a face, (and a handsome one at that because of course how could the son of a deity be ordinary), to this fictional character which only serves to continue the delusions of religion, the ignorance from what is important, and the corruption of those who profit from it. Kevin Copeland would approve of this face.