Anatolia, the begining of civilizations that provides very important cultural data belonging to human history, has hosted many civilizations. The cultural data of these civilizations have also been a source of inspiration for many contemporary Turkish artists who want to draw inspiration from the lands they live in. The Mother Goddess, one of the main cultural elements of the civilizations in Anatolia, has been visualized with different shapes and images in many civilizations that reigned in these lands. Therefore, it has become a main source of interest for artists in expressing their feelings and thoughts, sometimes as an aesthetic image in its own right, sometimes as an allegorical and symbolic, and sometimes as a metaphorical means of expression. The purpose of this research is to determine the place and usage of idols, one of the important belief elements of Anatolian civilizations, in today's contemporary Turkish Painting Art. Qualitative method was used in the research and the data were obtained through work analysis and literature review. The research was limited by selecting two works from each of the artists who used idols in their paintings, in alphabetical order of surnames: Tomur Atagök, Hüseyin Elmas, Ahmet Özol, Süleyman Saim Tekcan and Meliha Yılmaz. As a result of the research, it was determined that Tomur Atagök and Hüseyin Elmas used idols as a metaphorical expression element in their works; Süleyman Saim Tekcan and Ahmet Özol used idols as an aesthetic image by taking advantage of their plastic structure, and Meliha Yılmaz used them as an allegorical and symbolic means of expression.

Keywords: Idol, Mother Goddess, Contemporary Turkish Painting, Anatolian Civilizations, Tomur Atagök, Hüseyin Elmas, Ahmet Özol, Süleyman Saim Tekcan, Meliha Yılmaz