Self and Subject

When I went to see "Self and subject" I was expecting a rather boring collection of portraits (since the website said it's a portrait exhibit). I was expecting to see the conventional portraits, forward facing, from waist up, and I was rather surprised to find the opposite of that. The painters represented in the exhibit depict themselves and others in very unconventional ways -- from the regular photograph-like portraits of Skyllas and Joseph P. Aulisio, to expressing their personal turmoil, such as John Kane's "Seen in the Mirror" or Hugo Sperger "What Doesn't Destroy Me", to representing people as buildings (A.G. Rizzoli), to collages, cement sculptures, dolls, plywood, and two of my favorite - Ray Materson's miniatures made of cotton thread make from unraveled socks, and Linda's Firedman Schmidt's "Hear no Evil" made out of scraps of her old clothing. Despite the face that all these portrait artists (and I cannot call them painters, because of the wide variety of media used) were all amateurs (and in most cases it really shows), I was amazed by the range of expression that can be defined as a portrait.