SELF-PORTRAIT 

Work by Veerle Michiels, 2O13
 

Self-portrait is a mirror that the artist holds up to himself. The intimate image shows the viewer how the artist sees himself or how he wants to be seen. The instrument of the self-portrait, the mirror, is the traditional place for self-examination.255 It thus constitutes the genre par excellence for the artist to explore and investigate the question of identity…

In contemporary art, the uniqueness and permanence of Man is questioned. The fragility of the concept of “personal identity” is being demonstrated.The resurgence of this debate on identity and the self, undoubtedly also due to Foucault's publication Les mots et les choses,from which many distilled “the end of man,” caused, paradoxically enough, the self-portrait as a traditional genre to regain prominence. While the genre was modernized through photography and the application of contemporary technologies, it was also modernized through performance.

n contemporary art, the question of identity is often understood broadly. Not only the identity of the artist is examined and questioned through art, but the entire personal identity that includes sexual and cultural identity, among other things.(Anne Mouton, 2010)