January 2008
Digital Portfolio
Most people walk by self portraits everyday and have no idea what they’re looking at. Most people think that self portraits are self explanatory and that there isn’t a deeper meaning behind self portraits. These people, however, are wrong. There are many different types of self portraits. Self portraits have been around for a while and down through the centuries the style of self portraits have changed with many different individual artists who expressed themselves differently, thus giving us our broad variety of self portraits.
Self portraits go as far back as the fifteenth century. Jean Fouquet’s self portrait, which was created in 1450 in gold on black enamel, is considered to be the earliest identifiable self portrait, although self portraits were seen as far back as the in 1365 B.C. in Ancient Egypt. Albrecht Durer’s self portrait, which was done in 1497, is one of the earliest known formal self portraits. It is also a legend that Phidias, a Greek Sculptor, was jailed for leaving his signature of a small self portrait of himself on the shield of Athena in 438 B.C. Self portraits have been created all around the world for many centuries.
Self portraits are done for many different reasons. Some people create self portraits as signatures. As stated earlier, Phidias left his self portrait as a signature on the shield of Athena. This style of self portrait was used a lot during the Middle Ages and the period of the Renaissance. Architects of cathedrals would carve their images in their finished work leaving their signature for all to see. Jan Van Eyck used his self portrait as a signature in one of his paintings, Wedding Portrait, in 1434. In this picture he draws a couple getting married. There is a mirror in the background of the picture where he places himself as his signature. Many people have utilized this type of self portrait.
Some more styles of self portraits closely related to the signature are self portraits as a projection of self and self portraits done as self studies. Artists tend to create self portraits as a projection of themselves to show themselves how they want to be seen. Albrecht Durer was famous for utilizing this style of self portraits. His first self portraits dates back to 1484 and he shows how his social status changes all the way to 1522. He projects himself differently in 1484 and his earlier paintings where he is seen wearing regular clothes and later down the line where he is seen wearing clothes that shows his success. An artist who used the style of self portraits as a self study is Rembrandt. Rembrandt is widely known for how utilized this style in his self portraits. Rembrandt depicted himself many times. He created countless self portraits between 1629 and 1669, the time of his first self portrait and his death. He studied himself a lot and depicted himself in many different ways. It shows how he went from being a poor, struggling artist to a successful artist. Rembrandt painted countless amounts of self portraits as if he were trying to find something within himself that he couldn’t see. Vincent Van Gough painted self portraits in this way also. Van Gough, unlike Rembrandt who painted many self portraits of himself in a 40 year time span, painted the majority of his self portraits in a few years before he committed suicide. He reveals about his self a man who was confused and struggling with life. He showed this in his painting Self Portrait with Bandaged Head in 1889 after he removed his ear. He looked lost and somewhere far away in the painting. It shows what he was feeling inside. Both Rembrandt and Van Gough used this style really well and became very successful.
There are more styles of self portraits that are not what always what they seem like fantasy self portraits, narrative self portraits, and metaphorical self portraits. In each of these different styles, the artists display themselves in ways that aren’t as easily seen as in the other styles of self portraits. Gustave Courbet was an artist who created his self portraits as fantasies. He would paint himself in a scene showing his surroundings, which let the viewer know more about him. It allowed the viewer to see him as a person in his life, opposed to the viewer just seeing his emotions expressed on canvas. Pablo Picasso painted self portraits utilizing the Narrative style. In the 1960’s, he created a series of work that portrayed himself through the narrative style of self portraits. Marc Chagall was also another artist who used this style. He created a memoir of his childhood in Russia in his painting I and the Village, created in 1911. It showed something deep within him that he wanted to reveal.
There are many different styles of self portraits. Many artists have used these different styles to express themselves. Self portraits are ways artists can show their viewers something deep inside them that they wish to reveal; can let go of anger, stress, or any type of emotion; leave a legacy behind for people to follow (signatures); and show their lives. Self portraits have always been big since the invention of mirrors and will continue to be big and popular as long as there is someone out there who wishes and is willing to express themselves physically, mentally, and emotionally to the world.
Works Citied
January 12th, 2008
Self Portrait. Wikipedia:The Free Encyclopedia January 9th, 2008
January 12th, 2008
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