ART & ARTISTS: Artist's Self-Portraits

Friday, 19 January 2018

Artist's Self-Portraits - part 3

A series on artist’s self-portraits. Some are famous as portraitists, others not so much, but very many artists have painted their own portraits over centuries. Some of the more contemporary artists became more experimental with their style of painting as time went on, and it’s interesting to see that development in their own portraits as well.

I decided to run the series in alphabetical order rather than chronological order, to give a more interesting mix of styles through the ages.

This is part 3 of an 8-part series on Artist’s Self Portraits:

Arthur Eric Rowton Gill ARA (1882 Steyning, UK – 1940 Uxbridge, UK) was an English sculptor, typeface designer, and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement.

Eric Gill 1927 Self-Portrait
wood engraving on paper 18.1 x 12.1 cm
Tate, London

Eric Gill 1927

Émile Henri Bernard (1868 Lille, France – 1941 Paris, France) was a French Post-Impressionist painter and writer, who had artistic friendships with Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin and Eugène Boch, and at a later time, Paul Cézanne.

Émile Bernard 1888 Self-Portrait with Portrait of Gauguin
oil on canvas 46 x 56 cm
Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Émile Bernard 1891 Self-Portrait, Le Grand Oublié
oil on canvas 111.5 x 92 cm
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Émile Bernard 1897 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 52 x 42 cm
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Émile Bernard 1901 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 53 x 24 cm

Felix Nussbaum (1904 Osnabrück, Germany – 1944 Oświęcim, Poland) was a German-Jewish surrealist painter. Nussbaum’s artwork gives a rare glimpse into the essence of one individual among the victims of the Holocaust.

Felix Nussbaum 1927 Self-Portrait in a Green Hat
oil on canvas 55 x 41 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1938c Self-Portrait in a Hat
oil on canvas 62.5 x 50 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1938c Self-Portrait in the Studio
gouache and oil on paper 62 x 48 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1940 Self-Portrait in the Camp
oil on panel 52.5 x 41.5 cm
Private Collection

Felix Nussbaum 1941 Fear ( Self-Portrait with Niece)
oil on canvas 51 x 39.5 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1942 Self-Portrait with Felka Platek
oil on canvas 87 x 72 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1943 Self-Portrait with Easel
oil on canvas 75 x 55 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Felix Nussbaum 1943 Self-Portrait with a Jewish Identity Card
oil on canvas 56 x 49 cm
Kulturgeschichtliche Museum Osnabrück, Germany

Félix Edouard Vallotton (1865 Lausanne, Switzerland – 1925 Paris, France) was a Swiss/French painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis. He was an important figure in the development of the modern woodcut.

Félix Valloton 1885 Self-Portrait
Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts Lausanne, Switzerland

Félix Valloton 1897 Self-Portrait
oil on cardboard 48 x 59.2 cm
Private Collection

Félix Valloton 1905
Self-Portrait

Félix Valloton 1914 Self-Portrait with Dressing Gown
oil on canvas 65 x 81 cm
Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne, Switzerland

Joseph Fernand Henri Léger (1881 Argentan, France – 1955 Gif-sur-Yvette, France) was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style.

Fernand Léger 1918 Self-Portrait

Fernand Léger 1930 Self-Portrait
pencil 31 x 23.5 cm
Fernand Léger National Museum, Biot, France

Francis Bacon (1909 Dublin, Republic of Ireland – 1992 Madrid, Spain) was an Irish-born British figurative painter known for his bold, grotesque, emotionally charged, raw imagery. He is best known for his depictions of popes, crucifixions and portraits of close friends.

Francis Bacon 1969 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas

Francis Bacon 1973 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 35.5 x 30.5 cm

Francis Bacon 1975 Self-Portrait

Francis Bacon 1977 Two Studies for Self-Portrait

Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (1746 Fuendetodos, Spain – 1828 Bordeaux, France) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of late 18th and early 19th centuries and throughout his long career he was a commentator and chronicler of his era.

Francisco de Goya 1785 Self-Portrait in the Studio
oil on canvas 42 x 28 cm
Museo de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes, Madrid

Francisco de Goya 1795 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 18.2 x 12.2 cm
Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain

Francisco de Goya 1801c Self-Portrait with Spectacles
oil on canvas 63 x 49 cm
Musée Bonnat, Bayonne, France

Francisco de Goya 1815 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 51 x 46 cm
Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid, Spain

Frank Helmut Auerbach (1931 Berlin, Germany) is a German-British painter. Born in Germany, he has been a naturalised British citizen since 1947.

Frank Auerbach 1958 Self-Portrait
charcoal on paper collage laid down on card 77.2 x 56.5 cm

Frank Auerbach 1994-2201 Self-Portrait
pencil and graphite 76.4 x 57.7 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

Frida Kahlo de Rivera (1907 Coyoacán, Mexico - 1954 Coyoacán, Mexico) was a Mexican painter, who mostly painted self-portraits. Inspired by Mexican popular culture, she employed a naïve folk art style to explore questions of identity, post-colonialism, gender, class, and race in Mexican society.

George Wesley Bellows (1882 Columbus, Ohio – 1925 New York) was an American realist painter, known for his bold depictions of urban life in New York City, becoming, according to the Columbus Museum of Art, "the most acclaimed American artist of his generation.”

Frida Kahlo 1926 Self-Portrait Wearing a Velvet Dress

Frida Kahlo 1933 Self-Portrait with Necklace
oil on metal 29 x 34.5 cm
Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection, Mexico City

Frida Kahlo 1940 Self-Portrait
oil on board

Frida Kahlo 1940 Self-Portrait with Necklace of Thorns
oil on canvas 63.5 x 49.5 cm
Harry Ransom Humanities Research Centre Art Collection, University of Texas, Austin, Texas

Frida Kahlo 1941 Self-Portrait with Braid
oil on masonite 38.7 x 51 cm
Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection, Mexico City

Frida Kahlo 1948 Self-Portrait with Medallion

George Wesley Bellows was an American realist painter, known for his bold depictions of urban life in New York City, becoming, according to the Columbus Museum of Art, "the most acclaimed American artist of his generation.”

George Bellows 1921 Self-Portrait
lithograph 26.7 x 19.7 cm ( image )
The Metropolitan Museum f Art, New York

George Bellows 1921c Self-Portrait
watercolour 20 x 13.7 cm
Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT

George Frederic Watts, OM, RA (1817 London – 1904 Compton, UK) was an English Victorian painter and sculptor associated with the Symbolist movement. He said "I paint ideas, not things." Watts became famous in his lifetime for his allegorical works, such as Hope and Love and Life.

George Frederic Watts 1834 Self-Portrait, aged 17
oil on canvas 53.3 x 38.1 cm
Watts Gallery, Guildford, UK

George Frederic Watts 1864 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 64.8 x 52.1 cm
Tate, London

George Gower (1540 England – 1596 London) was an English portrait painter who became Serjeant Painter to Queen Elizabeth I in 1581.

George Gower 1579 Self-Portrait

George Benjamin Luks (1867 Williamsport, PA – 1933 New York) was an American realist artist and illustrator. His vigorously painted genre paintings of urban subjects are examples of the Ashcan School of American art.

George Luks 1907 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas

George Stubbs ARA (1724 Liverpool, UK – 1806 London) was an English painter, best known for his paintings of horses.

George Stubbs 1759c Self-Portrait
oil on copper 14 x 10.8 cm
Yale Centre for British Art, New Haven, CT

George Stubbs 1765-75c Self-Portrait
oil on panel

George Stubbs Self-Portrait
enamel on Wedgwood plaque 69.7 x 53.1 cm
The National Gallery, London

Gilbert Spencer RA (1892 Cookham, UK – 1979 Cliveden, UK) was a British painter of landscapes, portraits, figure compositions and mural decorations. He worked in oils and watercolour. He was the younger brother of the painter Sir Stanley Spencer.

Gilbert Spencer 1928 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 35.6 x 30.5 cm
Tate, London

Gino Severini (1883 Cortona, Italy – 1966 Paris, France) was an Italian painter and a leading member of the Futurist movement. For much of his life he divided his time between Paris and Rome.

Gino Severini 1905 Self-Portrait

Gino Severini 1908 Self-Portrait with Panama Hat and Pipe
pastel
Private Collection

Gino Severini 1909 Self-Portrait with Cigarette
pastel on grey wove paper with inlays of blue and black fibres 50 x 29.4 cm
Art Institute of Chicago, IL