Image 1: Self portrait 1993 pencil on paper, 21 x 29 cm
How I perceive my own artwork changes constantly over the years. Past pictures often look remarkably different than from when I first produced them. This is especially true of my self portraits which often take on multiple meanings, triggering specific memories, the comparison to how young I looked, specific personal feelings of the time, and the artistic progress and creative experiments that I made over the years.
Image 2: Self portrait 1997 oil on primed paper, 10 x 15 cm
Each self portrait takes on a unique and different quality. The actual likeness varies from picture to picture, though I generally try to avoid slavish approaches to capturing accuracy, preferring to focus on a handful of elements. With myopic eyesight over the years I often deliberately painted with blurred vision to avoid detail.
Self portraits can document deeply personal moods, or help develop technical and observational skills, or reveal the complexity of the artistic temperament whilst communicating in a non verbal way.
Image 3: Self portrait 2002 acrylic on paper, 15 x 21 cm
An A4 sized pencil sketch, made in 1993, features a 21 year old me when I wore my hair like rock musician Neil Young (image 1). A few years later in 1997, I produced a small oil based painting, using a traditional colour palette of yellow ochre, burnt sienna, white and black (image 2). I deliberately used thick brush marks, inspired at the time in part by artists such as Vincent Van Gogh and Andre Derain with a flattening of the picture plane between foreground and background (minus the vivid colours). I was also attending casual life classes at the time and utilised this same thick brushed approach.
Image 4: Self portrait 2004 chalk pastel on paper, 15 x 21 cm
Aside from just pure artistic elements, portraits also make for a documentary of styles and trends that one adopted over the years. In 2002 I sported a French crop hairstyle that was very fashionable at the time. My mother remarked that I looked a bit like Napolean! In response to her comment I produced a sideways glancing painting with a slight Greco-Roman affect (image 3). I used two mirrors to achieve the pose, which resulted in the correct left-right orientation (naturally most of my portraits are rendered the wrong way around.)
In 2004 I was a trainee art therapist at an occupational therapy department in north west London. Though I never quite fitted in with a clinical environment and academia, I enjoyed the experience of the art room. A pastel drawing (image 4) shows me with the same trendy haircut, rendered with vibrant colours that chalk pastels bring. If you look closely you can make out a pair of wire spectacles that I was wearing, also trendy at the time (I worked over them as I completed the drawing.)
Image 5: A painting of my mug (detail) 2013 acrylic on card, 15.5 x 22 cm
Portraits can take on irony, though it is not something that I generally contrive to create in my work. One such ‘ironic’ portrait I made, however, was the image ‘A painting of my mug’ (image 5), made in 2013, with me drinking from a ‘I love New York’ mug. (The letters on the mug are displayed in mirror image.)
The painting was a response after I visited an open studio event by fellow painter Rachel Glittenberg who had produced several situational portraits. Though her work and style was somewhat different to mine, I went away and made a self portrait with me doing something in a specific situational setting for a change.
Image 6: Self portrait 2016 oil on primed paper, 12 x 16 cm
Working with oil paints is highly rewarding with portraits. A small example (image 6), dating from 2014, captures me in a somewhat pensive mood, likely exacerbated by the strong lighting from above. Luminescence is a quality that oils brings out really well and the medium naturally provides painterliness without being driven to slavish rendering.
Whenever people ask me to make a portrait of them they always insist on being looking ‘beautiful’. I can safely say that such vanity is not usually present in my own self portraits (honest!)
Image 7: Self portrait 2021 acrylic on card 15 x 21 cm
The ability to face and paint what is now is what keeps one staying sane, especially in a lockdown. For my most recent portrait (image 7), I used an angle poise lamp with a warm light to make a contrast against my dark hair and t-shirt, setting against a neutral backdrop. A bearded me reflects a current stage and age in my own life. The painting resembles the drawing that I made back in 1993: same positioning of the sitting, shaggy hair, staring concentrated eyes, an artist making a simple observational piece of work.
In today’s technological age, it seems that anyone can easily create a ‘self portrait’ via a hand held smart device. The need to recognise others and be recognised and affirmed is, of course, basic human nature. Selfies using a digital smartphone are fun to make but there is something vastly more satisfying - and important - than painting or drawing a self portrait. It is not just communication with others, it is also contact with oneself.