We use facial expressions and hand gestures to communicate our emotions and attitudes. Everyone’s face is different and our fingerprints are unique to each of us. Portraiture (making art to record how someone looks) dates as far back as ancient Egypt, long before the invention of the selfie! Portraiture soon became a lot more than just a visual record, involving extravagant costumes, expensive furniture, props, and hand gestures to communicate the importance of the sitter. Other artists moved away from this, recording the faces of everyday people. Artists also started making portraits of themselves, which is called a self-portrait.

Vincent van Gogh, Self Portrait, 1889

ACTIVITY: HAND SELF PORTRAITS

A self-portrait needn’t even include our face at all if we don’t want it to, in fact, we can decide which aspects of our personality to highlight or ignore in any way we like. Use a pencil or a thick pen to draw around your hand - you may like to ask someone to help you with this. Now fill and decorate your hand shape with anything you think represents you best, it could be a drawing of your face (using a small mirror to help you) or lots of small drawings of your favourite things. You could fill it with your favourite colours or the type of patterns you like to make, or you could fill it with words - describe how you feel, add the names of your friends, or list your favourite things.

MATERIALS

• Paper
• Fibre tip pens
• Drawing pens
• Pencils
• Mirror
• Coloured pencils
• Paint

Thomas Croft, Selfie

Artist Inspiration: Look at some of the portraits and self-portraits by the following artists and discuss them with your group: Elizabeth I portraits, Van Gogh, Frida Kahlo, Cindy Sherman, John Coplans, Thomas Croft. Explore the following online exhibitions at Google Arts & Culture: ‘How we see ourselves’.

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