The Temptation and Expulsion from the Garden of Eden
by Michelangelo. 1512
Here is a portrait of the Garden of Eden taken from the ceiling of the Sisten Chapel by Italian Renassaince artist Michelangelo in 1512. It is in reference to the biblical "garden of God" in which Adam and Eve take from the tree of knowledge, despite God's forbbiden word, and are later expelled due to their disobedience. This painting exudes the symbollic scene of the pair the moment they are tempted to eat from the tree by Satan in the form of a serpernt, and their ultimate exclusion from the paradise of Eden.
The title really alludes to John Milton's "Paradise Lost (Book 1)" and its prologue before the fall of man the moment the world changed due to Adam and Eve's actions in the book of Genesis. Adam and Eve eating from this tree defies the expectations that God has placed onto the world of obedience and innocence on earth. The painting as well as Milton's prose maintains the same binaries: It is the battle between good and evil, obedience and disobedience, mortal and immortal, natural and supernatural, knowledge and innocence.