The photo below came to mind as my posts of the past few days have progressed from representational to abstract (see Overdone?, Loquat Tree Detail, Nespoli, Abstract Nespoli, Nespol-Leaf Salad). I remember how cold it was that day in New York City. The sun was bright, however and the it was shining directly on the […]
The photo below is me as a child, but not one I took. I glommed it from an 8mm film my father must have taken, that was converted to video. Originally, I posted this in Micro Expressions. I was not sure what my expression meant, but it didn’t seem to be a happy one. I wonder […]
The idea for today’s self portrait was to use color to depict near and far planes in the multiple-view portrait of myself. As with yesterday’s post, the self portrait below combines my image with that of my brother Michael. Mike is autistic, low functioning and nonverbal. I have included him as part of my image, […]
A person is often formed by what he or she sees. In the photomontage/self portrait below, you see the back of my head dissolving into my brain, which is somehow processing all that it sees and feels.* *Note that the black and white photographs are of my family and my brother Michael
Today’s post presents another variation in my exploration of the self portrait. (See Self Portrait – Photo Therapy, Merged Self Portrait, Combination Portrait, Three Views, Self Portrait – Revisited, Big Self Portrait, Engaged, Self Portrait in Three Quarters.) Yesterday’s self portrait (It Was Inevitable) connected my ‘self’ with my impression of my brother’s self. (My brother Mike is […]
Yesterday’s portrait (Self Portrait in Three Quarters) was the inspiration for today’s. I separated the two planes of my face by rendering the part in shadow as a deep blue and the other in flesh tones. The Cubists broke up the structural space of their compositions with line and plane, but also with color (Jawlensky and the Serial Image […]
Another self portrait influenced by Alexej Jawlensky. This time, I used a 3/4 view of my face and, with my limited understanding of cubistic division of space, decided to paint the shadow in a flat, dark blue. The result is two portraits: the painting as a whole, a 3/4 view; and the silhouette of the […]
I continue with my self portrait series in this post. In yesterday’s Big Self Portrait, I was trying to illuminate my face from the bottom. Somehow the halloweenish grotesqueness of eerie shadows eluded me, but my main goal in that sketch was to use the entire page. Today’s self portrait reigns-in the size a bit (at […]
I got a few books out of the library about Alexej Jawlensky. I love his abstract portraits. One aspect of his work that interested me quite a bit was its repetitive nature. He developed his vision from more representational to abstract. Among his portraits are several series ‘Constructivist Heads’ , ‘Meditations’, ‘Variations’. The major elements of […]
I do believe that a self portrait, in addition to being a representation of one’s likeness, contains a visual narrative about one’s relationship with one’s self. It is a time capsule that says captures the person’s identity. As with family snapshots, it is worthwhile now and then to revisit one’s self portraits. Below is a favorite of mine. […]
