Self-Portraits & Unfinished Paintings

Can you guess which artist (who is not depicted here) has painted the most self-portraits? Many artists will do their own portrait instead of paying a model to sit for them. This artist who was too poor to afford models is one of my all-time favorite artists whose most famous painting I use as my nickname. BTW, Picasso comes in as a close second! I'll reveal it later at the end of this post.

Can you guess what famous person painted the self-portrait below?

One of my favorite projects is inspired by the Modigliani portrait, "Girl with Braids". The project uses patterned paper to make self-portraits. The challenge is to get the feature shapes to stand out via the use of contrasting colors and patterns. When the finished portraits were hung at school, an older volunteer, not knowing that I was partly responsible, called them 'hideous'. But that's the beauty of art -- everyone has their own opinion. When asked whether or not you like a particular artwork always say why.

4th or 5th-Grade Self-Portraits

Some of these examples are from other sites, showing various techniques from tissue paper backgrounds to torn pieces of paper. The wrapping paper portraits were done in my class.

Other inspirations are American Artist, Gilbert Stuart, who painted the famous portraits of our 1st president, and Sir Joshua Reynolds - hence the project: "Reynolds Wrapping Paper Self-Portraits". Ha!

Gilbert Stuart created the (above) Athenaeum Portrait of George Washington that currently hangs in the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. The unfinished work was used to paint 130 copies sold for $100 each and for the engraving of GW on the US $1 bill.

The only other unfinished painting I've ever seen is “An Allegory of Virtue”, attributed to Corregio (~1489-1534), which hangs in the Scottish National Gallery in Edenborough. In future posts, I plan to share photos of artwork I've viewed at art museums around the world.

I encourage my students to visit art galleries so that they may see works of art in-person. I tell them to view the art in two ways -- from a distance and then up close. Seeing the true size of paintings may surprise you, like the grand scale of Chagall's works in Nice, or the petite size of the Mona Lisa hanging in the Louvre in Paris, France.