yalla, yalla

Faces of power create ‘god-given’ qualities- tracing back to the ancient world where artists depicted such figures as Alexander the great clad in panther skin – associating themselves with demi-gods and mythical beings. You can also start to think of contemporary faces dominating similar themes in culture today in film, adverts, literature, music, photography, comics, album covers or graffiti art- like Dr Horrible or Jim Morrison.

Shearer West (2004) expresses this globalization and expansion of media with more versatile possibilities for such rigid academic histories of portraiture – though West stops at the 1990’s basement tapes; contemporary selves- though there has been a development substantially over this period of twenty years which has risen to a larger access of independent and commercial mediums such as film which deals with a backdrop- painterly aspect of art and with it creating its new production and acclaimed convergence.

WJT Mitchell (2008) asks what do images want, what do we want from an image– ‘we need to grasp both sides of the paradox of the image: that is alive – but also dead; powerful but also weak; meaningful- but also meaningless.’ Mitchell explores a more anonymous approach to self – discussing the role of contemporary imagery on the ‘War on Terror’ and the mass assimilation of bodies of war. Director Stephen Poliakoff shows a clever, specific use of the photograph through dramatization and documentation- Nicholas Whoe wrote of his ‘idiosyncratic treatment of the past.’ Artists, filmmakers, musicians, writers etc; who use the self specifically or anonymously to engage with wider themes will set out to personify. Wim Wenders ‘Don’t come knocking’ (2005) creates a Hooper – esque- Twin Peaks (Lynch) oddity of characters– Wender’s creates a paradox of a washed up Western film star – the cinematography becomes almost a eerie product of the same fabrication of pre early 1920’s American western films – he uses character clichés to mislead.

The writer Roy Porter (1996) explores the idea of new sciences and an increased sense of development through natural and moral philosophies through society and culture lead to a wider exploration into self-examination during the twentieth century. From the 1970’s- 1990’s aesthetics almost disappeared from art history, theory and cultural studies – this was thought of as elitist and politically regressive - Lucy R Lippard (1990) ‘Mixed blessings: New Art in Multicultural America’ discuses how post-modern theory could analyse ‘everything to shreds’ …’wallowing in textual paranoia.’ Which can also add to a battered, cage like shadow looming over the painterly aspect.

Andrew Stewart referenced in ‘Portraiture Oxford History Of Art’ (2004) p. 32

Shearer West ‘Portraiture Oxford History Of Art’ (2004), p. 220

Nicolas Wroe, Guardian, 28 November (2009), p.12

Dominic Willsdon and Diarmuid Costello ‘The Life and Death of Images: Ethics and Aesthetics: Exchanges on Art and Culture’ (2008) p.45-55

Fracis Frascina and Johnathan Harris ‘Art In Modern Culture: An Anthology Of Critical Texts’ p.164 p1-4

Roy Porter ‘Re Writing The Self: Histories from the Renaissance to the present’ 1996 p.5-10