Auto Portraits

Automobiles, trucks and SUVs make their way through Manhattan traffic on a daily basis, clogging the thoroughfares with a constant barrage of noise and pollution. Here Michael Spano concentrates on the person behind the wheel, honing in on facial expressions and upper-body positions trapped within, yet protected by, the rigid structure of the automobile. The drivers appear unaware of the busy metropolis, revealing a segment of American car culture grounded in the urban locale.

Exploring what motivates artists to paint or photograph themselves, the author selects over 100 self-portraits from the National Portrait Gallery to examine the style, techniques and personalities of the sitters, including William Hogarth, Thomas Gainsborough, Angelica Kauffmann, and more.

The lifetime work of recently discovered street photographer Vivian Maier has captivated the world and spawned comparisons to photography's masters including Diane Arbus, Helen Levitt, Lisette Model, Walker Evans and Weegee. Now, for the first time, Vivian Maier: Self-Portrait will present the fullest and most intimate portrait of the artist herself with approximately 60 never-before-seen black-and-white and colour self-portraits culled from the extensive Maloof archive, the preeminent collector of the work of Vivian Maier.

An exploration of the genesis and early development of the genre of self-portraiture in Italy in the 15th and 16th centuries. The author examines a series of self-portraits in Renaissance Italy, arguing that they represented the aspirations of their creators to change their social standing.

'Auto Focus' features the work of 75 contemporary photographers from around the world for whom self-portraiture is a central part of their work. Issues of identity, nationality, sexuality and race are raised by the portraits.

“Hall provides a lively cultural interpretation of the genre from the Middle Ages to today. . . . Rather than provide a series of ‘greatest hits,’ he is more concerned with the reasons why artists create self-portraits.” —The Weekly Standard The self-portrait may be the visual genre most identified with our confessional era, but modern artists are far from the first to have explored its power and potential. In this broad cultural survey of the genre, art historian and critic James Hall brilliantly maps the history of self-portraiture, from the earliest myths of Narcissus and the Christian tradition of “bearing witness” to the prolific self-image-making of today’s contemporary artists. Hall’s intelligent and vivid account shows how artists’ depictions of themselves have been part of a continuing tradition that reaches back centuries. Along the way he reveals the importance of the medieval mirror craze; the explosion of the genre during the Renaissance; the confessional self-portraits of Titian and Michelangelo; the biographical role of serial self-portraits by artists such as Courbet and van Gogh; themes of sex and genius in works by Munch, Bonnard, and Modersohn-Becker; and the latest developments of the genre in the era of globalization. Comprehensive and beautifully illustrated, the book features the work of a wide range of artists including Alberti, Caravaggio, Dürer, Emin, Gauguin, Giotto, Goya, Kahlo, Koons, Magritte, Mantegna, Picasso, Raphael, Rembrandt, and Warhol.

First published in 2000 this revised edition includes a large number of new images and shows the remarkable shift from analogue to digital photography that has taken place over the period. The book also features a playable labyrinth puzzle on the front cover.

In 1915 Vera Brittain began to wonder whether it was possible to 'make a book out of the very essence of one's self'. In this study, the author moves away from Brittain's already well-documented political passions - socialism, feminism and pacifism - to discuss her enduring fascination with philosophy and the problems surrounding the literary representation of subjectivity. Using the psychoanalytical, philosophical and literary theories known to Brittain as well as some more recent and pertinent theoretical developments, the author examines not only Brittain's explicitly autobiographical writings, but also all of her published novels, The Dark Tide (1923), Not Without Honour (1924), Honourable Estate (1936), Account Rendered (1945) and Born 1925 (1948). This insightful and accessible book details Brittain's innovative writing methods and re-evaluates her contribution to the development of the novel during the early twentieth century. The author offers a new and interesting perspective on one of the most popular writers of the First World War.