While Michelangelo sought to free human forms from stone, British sculptor Henry Moore left his abstract figures an integral part of the materials from which he hewed them. His sculptures seem to be the product of natural forces, as if water and wind erosion created the negative spaces and hollows. I

Modern sculpture, Mythic, Round, Spiritual, Voluminous

As Anglo-Irish tensions tore his country apart, William Butler Yeats sought to give Ireland songs of identity rooted in the island's particular history and myth. Invoking a strong sense of place and folk tradition, Yeats attempted to counter the rapid growth of industry and materialism that he saw as

Lyrical, Modernist poetry, Mythic, Rebel, Sublime, Tragic

For any literary teenager in the '60s, reading Kerouac's "On the Road" was a must. But immediately following that came Hermann Hesse's study of the Buddha's early life, "Siddhartha." It comes as no surprise, for Hesse was one of the major literary influences on the Beat generation ("Siddhartha" was

Contemplative, Modernist literature, Mythic, Self-reflection, Sincere, Spiritual

Both spiritual father and sustaining mother to an infant art, D. W. Griffith expanded the artistic horizons of audiences, safely shepherding cinema into adulthood and nurturing its unique language. Malcontent as a mere film actor, Griffith joined Biograph Studios in 1908 as a writer and director, del

Classic hollywood, Epic, Grand, Mythic, Pioneering, Political, Silent film