Self Portraiture
Reading Laura Cumming's piece about self-portraiture in the Observer over our cafe breakfast this morning, also here . I've been interested in the links between visual self-portraiture and literary self-portraiture - the memoir. Cummings also identifies a correspondence: 'Its special look, so sharp, so expectant, shifts straight into the first-person address, and self-portraiture has its counterparts in soliloquy and monologue, as well as fiction and memoir'.
She makes an interesting suggestion that the person depicted in the artwork may or may not be of a different identity from that of the portraitist. How do you separate the artist from his or her professionally depicted self, and does the same apply to the reflected and presented self in a literary memoir? 'The supposedly direct relation between mirror and canvas is confusing too. Who is this in the mirror: I or she? And when painted, has this self become someone independent of me?' The suggestion is that the mirror contains a 'different' self who is evoked in the painting rather than the self-portrait being a direct, unfiltered evocation of the artist's self. A sort of 'mirror-stage' crisis for artists. And certain distinguishing features are necessarily going to be presented in reverse. Poets have had fun with this idea of the distorted display of a mirrored self. John Ashberry most famously in 'Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror' which starts:
As Parmigianino did it, the right hand
Bigger than the head, thrust at the viewer
And swerving easily away, as though to protect
What it advertises. A few leaded panes, old beams,
Fur, pleated muslin, a coral ring run together
In a movement supporting the face, which swims
Toward and away like the hand
Except that it is in repose. It is what is
Sequestered. Vasari says, "Francesco one day set himself
To take his own portrait, looking at himself from that purpose
In a convex mirror, such as is used by barbers . . .
He accordingly caused a ball of wood to be made
By a turner, and having divided it in half and
Brought it to the size of the mirror, he set himself
With great art to copy all that he saw in the glass,"
Chiefly his reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection once removed.
The glass chose to reflect only what he saw
Which was enough for his purpose: his image
Glazed, embalmed, projected at a 180-degree angle.
Self depiction in literature is generally a carefully-crafted project. And rather like the self-portrait in art, the memoir has usually been considered an interesting addition to a writer's oeuvre rather than a central achievement; but this status is changing. Autobiography and memoir writing are now extremely popular genres. But at the same time there is a greater consciousness to the devices, especially of editing and dramatisation, which have been used to construct the memoir. Not so much an accurate 'reflection' in words as a mirror with some sort of built-in distortion. In some cases so much distortion as to cause indignation when the facts come out. According to James Frey, author of discredited autobiography 'A Million Little Pieces' (it was such a good read though!) 'The memoir is a corrupt genre' - but his is hopefully an extreme case. Other writers find that editing a memoir might make one more conservative with the truth in some respects but more authentic in conveying a real essence of what life used to be like. If we can talk about essences these days, that is. Careful presentation of setting and imagery, careful choice of register and language can seem to change everything.
The National Portrait Gallery have some interesting pages on self portraiture,
I've used them in class to stimulate cross-media discussion. Getting some literary explorations of the act of self-portraiture too: if you had the ability, how would you construct your own self-portrait? Could you build flashbacks into the narrative as the importance of each aspect of setting, media, mood, become apparent?
Must confess I'm not at all sure what I'd choose myself. Though in the spirit of self-presentation I've finally got my profile picture up here. But that's thanks to K- who helped by both taking the photo and helping me edit the template so I could upload as a reasonable size. Sometimes another pair of eyes is just what we need.
She makes an interesting suggestion that the person depicted in the artwork may or may not be of a different identity from that of the portraitist. How do you separate the artist from his or her professionally depicted self, and does the same apply to the reflected and presented self in a literary memoir? 'The supposedly direct relation between mirror and canvas is confusing too. Who is this in the mirror: I or she? And when painted, has this self become someone independent of me?' The suggestion is that the mirror contains a 'different' self who is evoked in the painting rather than the self-portrait being a direct, unfiltered evocation of the artist's self. A sort of 'mirror-stage' crisis for artists. And certain distinguishing features are necessarily going to be presented in reverse. Poets have had fun with this idea of the distorted display of a mirrored self. John Ashberry most famously in 'Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror' which starts:
As Parmigianino did it, the right hand
Bigger than the head, thrust at the viewer
And swerving easily away, as though to protect
What it advertises. A few leaded panes, old beams,
Fur, pleated muslin, a coral ring run together
In a movement supporting the face, which swims
Toward and away like the hand
Except that it is in repose. It is what is
Sequestered. Vasari says, "Francesco one day set himself
To take his own portrait, looking at himself from that purpose
In a convex mirror, such as is used by barbers . . .
He accordingly caused a ball of wood to be made
By a turner, and having divided it in half and
Brought it to the size of the mirror, he set himself
With great art to copy all that he saw in the glass,"
Chiefly his reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection once removed.
The glass chose to reflect only what he saw
Which was enough for his purpose: his image
Glazed, embalmed, projected at a 180-degree angle.
Self depiction in literature is generally a carefully-crafted project. And rather like the self-portrait in art, the memoir has usually been considered an interesting addition to a writer's oeuvre rather than a central achievement; but this status is changing. Autobiography and memoir writing are now extremely popular genres. But at the same time there is a greater consciousness to the devices, especially of editing and dramatisation, which have been used to construct the memoir. Not so much an accurate 'reflection' in words as a mirror with some sort of built-in distortion. In some cases so much distortion as to cause indignation when the facts come out. According to James Frey, author of discredited autobiography 'A Million Little Pieces' (it was such a good read though!) 'The memoir is a corrupt genre' - but his is hopefully an extreme case. Other writers find that editing a memoir might make one more conservative with the truth in some respects but more authentic in conveying a real essence of what life used to be like. If we can talk about essences these days, that is. Careful presentation of setting and imagery, careful choice of register and language can seem to change everything.
The National Portrait Gallery have some interesting pages on self portraiture,
I've used them in class to stimulate cross-media discussion. Getting some literary explorations of the act of self-portraiture too: if you had the ability, how would you construct your own self-portrait? Could you build flashbacks into the narrative as the importance of each aspect of setting, media, mood, become apparent?
Must confess I'm not at all sure what I'd choose myself. Though in the spirit of self-presentation I've finally got my profile picture up here. But that's thanks to K- who helped by both taking the photo and helping me edit the template so I could upload as a reasonable size. Sometimes another pair of eyes is just what we need.
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