SELF PORTRAITURE

Since the Renaissance, artists have used self-portraits to explore a basic question: Who am I? While a
mirror or a photograph can tell a person what he or she looks like, that physical image does not reflect the
whole self. Self-portraiture insists the artist embark on a journey of self-exploration in order to make
decisions about how to represent him/herself authentically. For each self-portrait, the artist must ask: What
expression, posture, clothing, background, colors, texture, and style best express the real me? Might those
answers be different at any given time?

Artists have always had practical reasons for making self-portraits; for instance, they get a model who is
always available and works for free; self-portraits are a good way for an artist to practice rendering
different expressions and moods; and they can serve to advertise the artist’s skill to potential customers.
Self-portraits may also represent an artist’s quest for immortality, as a way to leave behind an image that
will outlive the artist. Additionally, a self-portrait can preserve a memory, serve as a gift, and even help an
artist further understand him/herself.

Questions

Who am I? is not a simple question. In fact, it leads to a long list of related questions. Here are a few:

 What are the distinctive things that make me "me"?

 How do I want people to see me?
 How can I express my many different sides?
 How can I reinvent myself for various purposes or times in my life?
 How am I changing from day to day or year to year?
 Who do I want to become?

Keywords

in·te·ri·or·i·ty
Function: noun
Date: 17011 : interior quality or character
2 : inner life or substance : psychological existence
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/interiority

intertextuality - The introduction of another text and its meaning inside the present text. (Artlex.com)

nar·cis·sism [nahr-suh-siz-em]
–noun

1.inordinate fascination with oneself; excessive self-love; vanity.

2.Psychoanalysis. erotic gratification derived from admiration of one's own physical or mental attributes, being
a normal condition at the infantile level of personality development.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/narcissism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism
trompe l'oeil - A French term literally meaning "trick the eye." Sometimes called illusionism, it's a style of
painting which gives the appearance of three-dimensional, or photographic realism. It flourished from the
Renaissance onward. The discovery of linear perspective in fifteenth-century Italy and advancements in the
science of optics in the seventeenth-century Netherlands enabled artists to render object and spaces with eye-
fooling exactitude. Both playful and intellectually serious, trompe artists toy with spectators' seeing to raise
questions about the nature of art and perception.

 This story originated in ancient Greece:Two painters were rivals in a contest. Each would try to make a picture
that produced a more perfect illusion of the real world. One, named Zeuxis [ZOO-ziss], painted a likeness of
grapes so natural that birds flew down to peck at them. Then his opponent, Parrhasius [pahr-HAY-zee-us]
brought in his picture covered in a cloth. Reaching out to lift the curtain, Zeuxis was stunned to discover he had
lost the contest. What had appeared to be a cloth was in reality his rival's painting.

http://www.artlex.com/

Quotes

“Everyone wants to understand art. Why don’t we try to understand the song of a bird? Why do we love the
night, the flowers, everything around us, without trying to understand them? But in the case of a painting,
people think they have to understand. If only they would realize above all that an artist works of necessity, that
he himself is only an insignificant part of the world, and that no more importance should be attached to him
than to plenty of other things which please us in the world though we can’t explain them; people who try to
explain pictures are usually barking up the wrong tree.” — Picasso

Might not a painter’s choice of lines and colors give an indication of his character, whether it is noble or
common . . . —January 1885 to friend Emile Schuffenecker

It is the face of an outlaw . . . with an inner nobility and gentleness . . . I offer an image, a portrait of myself to
all wretched victims of society. —October 1888 to Vincent van Gogh

In art, the state of one’s soul is of the greatest importance. One therefore has to take great care of it, if one
intends to create something great and permanent. —1889 to Danish painter J. F. Willumsen

Websites

http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/self_portraits/act_intro_self.shtm
http://www.marshallmcluhan.com/main.html
http://www.forvo.com/
http://www.banksy.co.uk/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1179969/Banksy---Banksy-Self-portrait-confirm-elusive-artists-identity-last.html
http://www.picasso.fr/us/picasso_page_index.php
http://www.roslynoxley9.com.au/artists/26/Tracey_Moffatt/
http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/irvinem/visualarts/art-theory-intro.html
http://www.emergiblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/broken-egg.JPG
http://itodyaso.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/volcano.jpg
http://www.emeagwali.com/pablo-picasso/photos/pablo-ruiz-picasso-biography-painting-picture-guernica-cubism-self-
portrait-art-biografia-6.jpg
http://tothewire.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/picasso_self_portrait_blue_period_apres_picasso1.jpg
http://www.metapedia.com/wiki/index.php?title=Intertextuality
Artists

William Robinson

Born Brisbane 1936 -

Like a stunned mullet: Colloquial a. in complete bewilderment or astonishment b. in a state of inertia

(Macquarie Dictionary)

Portraits usually record the customary appearance of the sitter, and reveal an aspect of character. Robinson's
quizzical self portrait seems to deflect these aims, and to impart its ideas through visual puns, the rhyme of
similar shapes, and quotations from other paintings. In this work Robinson based his facial expression on
William Hogarth's The shrimp girl 1740-45 (NGA London), a painting noted for its vivid reflection of
contemporary English street-life. Robinson reverses the effect of The shrimp girl's smiling expression, using it
to vacate his face of spontaneous life. The painting was awarded the Archibald Prize in 1995, and prompted
conflicting opinions. It was rebuked by Elwyn Lynn as 'dead', and welcomed as 'outstanding' by Jeffrey Smart.

http://www.visualarts.qld.gov.au/content/robinson_standard.asp?name=Robinson_Self_Portraits_1747_107

Banksy

Born Bristol England 1974 -

Banksy Portrait sells for £198,000. A self-portrait by Banksy set a new artist record of 198,000 pounds at
auction today. The unframed work, featuring a stencil of a chimp's head, carried an estimate of just £40,000. It
was snapped up by a US buyer at Bonham's auction house in central London. The price tag smashed the guerilla
artist's previous record of 102,000 pounds set at Sotheby's earlier this year for Bombing Middle England.

After that sale, Banksy posted a message on his website captioned: "I can't believe you morons buy this sh*t".
Banksy prefers to keep his identity secret but he is believed to hail from Bristol.Self portrait was bought by
today's seller from an exhibition in the city in 2000 before the artist hip the big time.

Charles Dupplin, art expert at specialist insurer Hiscox, said: "Another huge Banksy sale and another record-
breaking price for the artist show how much interest there is in him at the moment." Banksy is often considered
at his best when he makes political statements through art but a self-portrait is also

a great piece to own, especially given the artist's mysteriousness."

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/46668-banksy-self-portrait-sells-for-198k
Pablo Picasso

1881 – 1973

Text from Thomas Hoving, "Art For Dummies®"

"Yet Cubism and Modern art weren't either scientific or intellectual; they were visual and came from the eye
and mind of one of the greatest geniuses in art history. Pablo Picasso, born in Spain, was a child prodigy who
was recognized as such by his art-teacher father, who ably led him along. The small Museo de Picasso in
Barcelona is devoted primarily to his early works, which include strikingly realistic renderings of casts of
ancient sculpture.

"He was a rebel from the start and, as a teenager, began to frequent the Barcelona cafes where intellectuals
gathered. He soon went to Paris, the capital of art, and soaked up the works of Manet, Gustave Courbet, and
Toulouse-Lautrec, whose sketchy style impressed him greatly. Then it was back to Spain, a return to France,
and again back to Spain - all in the years 1899 to 1904.

"Before he struck upon Cubism, Picasso went through a prodigious number of styles - realism, caricature, the
Blue Period, and the Rose Period. The Blue Period dates from 1901 to 1904 and is characterized by a
predominantly blue palette and subjects focusing on outcasts, beggars, and prostitutes. This was when he also
produced his first sculptures. The most poignant work of the style is in Cleveland's Museum of Art, La Vie
(1903), which was created in memory of a great childhood friend, the Spanish poet Casagemas, who had
committed suicide. The painting started as a self-portrait, but Picasso's features became those of his lost friend.
The composition is stilted, the space compressed, the gestures stiff, and the tones predominantly blue. Another
outstanding Blue Period work, of 1903, is in the Metropolitan, The Blind Man's Meal. Yet another example,
perhaps the most lyrical and mysterious ever, is in the Toledo Museum of Art, the haunting Woman with a
Crow (1903).

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/P/picasso.html

Tracey Moffatt  

Born Brisbane, 1960-.

In my portraits I have tried to capture their spirit and likeness, but only “at a moment’s glance”. It is almost like
the moment when you see a famous person in a restaurant. Everyone is craning their necks to get a glimpse,
only to end up with a fleeting view of the back of the celebrity as they exit into the VIP room.

I shot the photographs with a simple digital camera in my loft against a bed sheet curtain, and in my cramped
awful bathroom. I then added the high-key supernatural colored landscape backgrounds to the images on my
computer. Rather than a formal portrait, I wanted a very pop, almost comic book quality. I propose that all of
these women are ‘pop figures’, they are a part of the landscape of popular western culture.”

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/yourgallery/artist_profile/Tracey+Moffatt/97117.html
William Robinson Self portrait with stunned mullet 1994 Oil on canvas
197 x 164cm Private Collection
Banksy Self Portrait, Unframed
 Pablo Picasso
Self-Portrait. 1907. Oil on canvas. 50 x 46cm Narodni Gallery, Prague, Czechia.
 Tracey Moffatt Self Portrait, 1999
handcoloured photograph 33.5 × 22cm
Edition of 10 + 2 A/Ps