By: The Anne Frank Group
Presented by( in the order):
Mohit Choudhary
Abhinav Yadav
Ejaz Akram
Amanjot Singh
• A self-portrait is a representation of an artist, drawn, painted,
photographed, or sculpted by the artist. artist-model must alternately
pose and paint.
• The artist works from memory as well as sight, in two levels of time,
on two planes of space, while reaching for those other dimensions,
depth and the future.
• Although self-portraits have been made by artists since the earliest
times, it is not until the Early Renaissance in the mid 15th century that
artists can be frequently identified depicting themselves as either the
main subject, or as important characters in their work.
• With better and cheaper mirrors, and the advent of
the panel portrait, many painters, sculptors and printmakers tried
some form of self-portraiture.
• Portrait of a Man in a
Turban by Jan van Eyck of
1433 may well be the
earliest known panel selfportrait.
Raphael, c. 1517-1518, Uffizi Gallery
Leonardo da Vinci( 1512)- Self-Portrait
• A self-portrait may be a portrait of the artist, or a portrait
included in a larger work, including a group portrait.
• In the earliest surviving examples of medieval
and renaissance self-portraiture, historical or mythical scenes
(from the Bible or classical literature) were depicted using a
number of actual persons as models, often including the artist,
giving the work a multiple function as portraiture, selfportraiture and history/myth painting.
• Ex: Rubens's The Four Philosophers (1611–12)
Rubens's The Four Philosophers
• In the famous Arnolfini
Portrait (1434), Jan van
Eyck is probably one of two
figures glimpsed in a mirror a surprisingly modern conceit.
• In what may be one of the
earliest childhood self-portraits
now surviving, Albrecht
Dürer depicts himself as in
naturalistic style as a 13-year
old boy in 1484. In later years
he appears variously as a
merchant in the background
of Biblical scenes and as Christ
In the 17th
Century, Rembrandt painted a range
of self-portraits. In The Prodigal Son in
the Tavern (c1637), one of the earliest
self-portraits with family, the painting
probably includes Saskia, Rembrandt's
wife, one of the earliest depictions of
a family member by a famous artist.
Family and professional group
paintings, including the artist's
depiction, became increasingly
common from the 17th Century
onwards.
• Portraits and self-portraits have a longer continuous history in
Asian art than in Europe.
• Many in the scholar gentleman tradition are quite small,
depicting the artist in a large landscape, illustrating a poem
in calligraphy on his experience of the scene.
• Another tradition, associated with Zen Buddhism, produced
lively semi-caricatured self-portraits, whilst others remain closer
to the conventions of the formal portrait.
Hakuin Ekaku was a Zenmonk, who painted
Miyamoto Musashi, Samurai, writer and artist, c.
many self-portraits of himself as sages of
1640.
the past, 1764, Tokyo.
Motoori Norinaga, late 18th century, Japan
Rabindranath Tagore, self portrait
• Illuminated manuscripts contain a number of apparent selfportraits, notably those of Saint Dunstan and Matthew Paris
• Orcagna is believed to have painted himself as a figure in
a fresco of 1359, which became, at least according to art
historians - Vasari records a number of such traditions- a
common practice of artists.
• Benozzo Gozzoli includes himself, with other portraits, in
the Palazzo Medici Procession of the Magi (1459), with his
name written on his hat.
Benozzo Gozzoli
Saint Dunstan, then artist-Abbot of Glastonbury, Peter Parler, late fourteenth century,
from Prague Cathedral, where he was
prostrates himself before a giant Christ. Later
master architect and sculptor
he became Archbishop of Canterbury. c. 950
Lorenzo Ghiberti on the Gates of
Paradise, Baptisterio, Florence self portrait,
early 15th century
Jean Fouquet, c. 1450, a very
early portrait miniature, and if the Van
Eyck above is excluded, the oldest
individual Western painted self-portrait.
• The great Italian painters of the Renaissance made
comparatively few formal painted self-portraits, but often
included themselves in larger works.
• Most individual self-portraits they have left were
straightforward depictions:
Gentile Bellini, black chalk, 1496 or earlier,
Berlin
Nuremberg sculptor Adam Kraft, self-portrait
from St Lorenz Church, 1490s.
Probable self-portrait byLeonardo da Vinci, c.
1512-1515
Nicholas Hilliard, self-portrait miniature,
1577
• In the 17th century, Flemish and Dutch artists painted themselves
far more often; by this date most successful artists had a
position in society where a member of any trade would
consider having their portrait painted.
• Rembrandt was the most frequent self-portraitist, at least until
the self-obsessed modern period, also often painting his wife,
son and mistress. At one time about ninety paintings were
counted as Rembrandt self-portraits, but it is now known that he
had his students copy his own self-portraits as part of their
training.
• His self-portraits form a unique and intimate biography, in
which the artist surveyed himself without vanity and with the
utmost sincerity.
A young Rembrandt, c. 1628, when he was 22.
Partly an exercise in chiaroscuro.Rijksmuseum
Rembrandt in 1632, when he was enjoying
great success as a fashionable portraitist in
this style.
1640, wearing a costume in the style of over a
century earlier. National Gallery
Dated 1669, the year he died,
though he looks much older in
other portraits. National Gallery,
London
• One of the most famous and most prolific of self-portraitists
was Vincent van Gogh, who painted himself thirty-seven
times between 1886 and 1889.
• The many self-portraits of Egon Schiele set new standards of
openness, or perhaps exhibitionism, representing him naked.
Vincent van Gogh, Self Portrait, dedicated to
Gauguin, 1888
• Throughout his long career, Pablo Picasso often used selfportraits to depict himself in the many different guises, disguises
and incarnations of his autobiographical artistic
persona. Picasso's self portraits depicted and revealed
complicated psychological insights, both personal and profound
about the inner state and well being of the artist.
• Another artist who painted interestingly personal and revealing
self-portraits throughout his career was Pierre Bonnard.
Bonnard also painted dozens of portraits of his wife Marthe
throughout her life as well.
picasso self portrait 1907
Pierre Bonnard- Self Portrait
Painters at work:
• Many of the medieval portraits show the artist at work, and Jan
van Eyck his chaperon hat has the parts normally hanging loose
tied up on his head, giving the misleading impression he is
wearing a turban, presumably for convenience whilst he
paints. In the early modern period, increasingly, men as well as
women who painted themselves at work had to choose whether
to present themselves in their best clothes, and best room, or to
depict studio practice realistically.
Pieter Brueghel the Elder, The Painter
and The Buyer, c.1565, pen and ink on
brown paper, presumed to be a selfportrait. Antwerp
Francesco Solimena, c. 1715.
François Boucher, self-portrait in the studio, 1720 Self-portrait c.1747-9 by Joshua Reynolds
• The self-portrait supposes in theory the use of a mirror; glass mirrors
became available in Europe in the 15th century. The first mirrors used
were convex, introducing deformations that the artist sometimes
preserved. A painting by Parmigianino in 1524 Self-portrait in a
mirror, demonstrates the phenomenon
• this use of the mirror often results in right-handed painters
representing themselves as left-handed (and vice versa). Usually the
face painted is therefore a mirror image of that the rest of the world
saw, unless two mirrors were used. Most of Rembrandt's self-portraits
before 1660 show only one hand - the painting hand is left
unpainted.[27] He appears to have bought a larger mirror in about
1652, after which his self-portraits become larger. In 1658 a large
mirror in a wood frame broke whilst being transported to his house;
nonetheless, in this year he completed his Frick self-portrait, his
largest.
Parmigianino Selfportrait
Johannes Gumpp, 1646, shows how
most self-portraits were painted
Michelangelo Buonarroti, circa 15351541, Sistine Chapel: The Last
Judgment, Michelangelo as a limp skin hanging
from the hand of St. Bartholomew.
Allegory of Prudence, Titian, his son and
the cousin he had virtually adopted, as
Past, Present and Future. National
Gallery, London, late 1560s.
• the self-portraits of many Contemporary
artists and Modernists often are characterized by a strong
sense of narrative, often but not strictly limited to vignettes from
the artists life-story. Sometimes the narrative resembles fantasy,
role-playing and fiction.
Cristofano Allori, Judith with the Head of
Holofernes, 1613. According to his biographer,
the heads were those of the painter, his exlover, and her mother. Compare Caravaggio
above
Gustave Courbet, 1854,Bonjour, Monsieur
Courbet. The artist has travelled to the South
of France (in the vanishing coach), to meet
the collector Alfred Bruyas, for whom this
was painted
François Desportes, a specialist animal
painter,Self-portrait as Hunter, 1699.
Gustave Courbet, Self Portrait
(The Desperate Man), c. 1843.
• Two methods of obtaining photographic self-portraits are
widespread. One is photographing a reflection in the mirror,
and the other photographing one's self with the camera in an
outstretched hand. Eleazar Langman photographed his
reflection on the surface of a nickel-plated teapot.
• Another method involves setting the camera or capture device
upon a tripod, or surface. One might then set the camera's
timer, or use a remote controlled shutter release.
Mathew Brady, self-portrait, circa 1875
Nadar, Revolving Self Portrait,c. 1865
Eleazar Langman, Self-portrait, 1935
Akihiko Hoshide taking a self-portrait during
extravehicular activity outside the International
Space Station
1. Campbell, Lorne; National Gallery Catalogues (new series): The Fifteenth Century
Netherlandish Paintings, pp 212-17, 1998, ISBN 1-85709-171-X
2. Accessed online July 28, 2007 an online history of self-portraits, various
excerpts from Edward Lucie-Smith and Sean Kelly, The Self Portrait: A Modern
View(London: Sarema Press, 1987)
3. "Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy: The graphic work of a Renaissance artist". New
York: Studio International Magazine. March 2003. Retrieved 2010-08-08.
4. Erwin Panofsky (and originally Fritz Saxl), Titian's "Allegory of Prudence", A
Postscript, in Meaning in the Visual Arts, Doubleday/Penguin, 1955
5. For this section and the gallery, Ernst van de Wetering in Rembrandt by himself,
p.10 andassim, 1999, National Gallery, London/Mauritshuis, The Hague, ISBN 185709-270-8
6. Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art, art of self-portrait Retrieved June 13,
2010
7. Rembrandt by himself, op cit, pp 11-13; for the Arnolfini reference see:
National Gallery Catalogues (new series): The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish
Paintings, Lorne Campbell, 1998, ISBN 185709171
8. And Special contribution to wikipedia.org and Google Image Search.
Leonardo Da Vinci, Self-portrait, c. 1512
to 1515.
William Morris, self portrait, 1856