Self Portrait Of The Artist Essay

There is an ancient concept in art that “every painter paints himself” and that is exactly the thought that echoes when walking through the “Portrait of the Artist” exhibition at the Vancouver Art gallery. On the walls are a variety of self-portraits created for various purposes. Some were made for introspection, never meant to be seen by a wide audience, others were made to create an image of accomplishment and assert the artist’s status. One self-portrait that captures the attention is A self-portrait as an ox by Thomas Patch because this one involves an artist creating an image of himself that seems humbling, though is, in reality utilizing false-modesty. The sight of this portrait in an exhibition on artist’s self-portraits creates a bigger picture of

It does not hide that artist have used self-portraiture to design “a carefully honed image, intended to appeal to a specific audience,” (“Portrait of the Artist”). Nevertheless it never goes further into how this has impacted the modern view of art and artists. Society is open to critique those who have created personas to attract fame and fortune in other industries such as film and music for superficial intent, however, in the institutional space there is no dialogue on the matter of this existence within the art world. A work like A self-portrait as an ox comes across as another self portrait with the artist designing a specific image of themself. There is no way to fathom whether the intent was to create this image as a way to critique self-absorption within art or a hypocritical piece to assert how humble the artist is. Regardless of the reasoning Patch is applying false modesty in this piece, a behaviour that no institution should ignore the phenomenon of, and instead ignite a debate on how it is being